While many women spend their lives dieting, or doing whatever it takes for the ripped, “fitness model” or competitor look, other ladies are choosing to walk away from industry all together. In this special interview, Danny-J (of The Sweaty Betties) was so awesome to share with us her experience not only to the competition stage, but also AWAY from it and its damaging extremes. If you’ve been dieting and killing yourself for hours in gym for longer than you can remember, yet feel like you’re moving further from who/where you thought you’d be by now — you will want to read EVERY word. Being over-trained and under–fed for a “look” was once her driving passion…how does she feel about it now?
EM2WL: At what age did you start competing? Danny-J: I was 25 when I started competing.. oh wow, that makes me sad
E: What inspired you to compete? D: Initially I was an acrobat and in really good shape and people just kept asking me if I competed. I didn’t even know what that meant so I looked into it. Then I was intrigued and very impressed with the bodies and I really wanted to have that kind of physique.
E: How long did you compete before deciding to leave the competition world? D: My first show was in December 2006 and my last show was in November 2009. So it was 3 years.
E: Did you always do Bikini or have you competed at multiple levels? D:I did Figure for my first two years (it was the only option besides bodybuilding) and the last year I tried two bikini shows.
E: How many competitions did you typically participate in per year? D: I did about 3 a year. It was too many.
E: Can you describe the weight fluctuations between off season and competition prep? What about changes to your diet? D: I didn’t have a lot of weight fluctuations. I was in great shape before competing and I mayyyybe would lose about 3-4 lbs. However, the more I competed the more I thought I had to do. I pushed too hard when I didn’t need to. After my last show I gained over 30 lbs and now I am still sitting about 15-18lbs above my old “normal” weight
E: Can you describe what a typical day was like when prepping for the stage? D: Eating the same meals every day, on the clock: 7am, 10am, 1pm, 4pm, 7pm, 10pm.
Usually a workout before work then cardio and then work. Then sometimes more cardio after work around 9-10pm.
E: You’ve mentioned on your website and in videos how competing has affected your metabolism. Were there any signs that led you to discover this? D: Sure, there were signs, that I heavily ignored. Fatigue, hunger, loss of sex drive. I thought these things were “normal” or “just part of the process” so I had to just “suck it up” …I felt like this was what set apart champions from the rest, was that “we” could tolerate some discomfort and lack of sleep. Little did I know how badly I was hurting myself and how long it would take to crawl out of that.
E: Can you tell our readers some of the extreme methods you utilized to achieve a ‘stage ready’ look? D: I would say, for me, it was just a very low calorie diet (900-1100 per day) for over 8 months straight with zero carbs nearly the whole time and an hour of cardio a day, 7 days per week and I worked two jobs. During my first year I did two hours of cardio a day, but I was eating carbs and I convinced myself that was better… it wasn’t. Luckily, I didn’t do any fat burners, T3, or other drugs I’ve heard of, but truth be told, I think I’m still just as damaged from the extreme dieting for so so long. Your body can only be deprived so long before it rebels.
E: Were there other areas, physical or psychological, impacted by competing? D: Absolutely. I was depressed. I went to the Dr. for Prozac. I thought I was crazy. I had anxiety because of my weight gain. My sex life was in the toilet, so obviously my marriage was affected. I didn’t even want my husband to touch me or see my body, which makes me want to cry now. I panicked about being in public. I didn’t want pictures taken of me. My skin was a mess, breaking out all the time. I felt completely exhausted, like a zombie, for months. Honestly, there were times I wanted to die.
E: Do you feel that there are any methods of prepping for Bodybuilding/Figure competitions that don’t compromise ones metabolism? D: I have seen very few coaches do it, but yes, I do believe there are. For one, I think that its making sure you have plenty of time to prep—this trying to lose 30 lbs in 12 weeks and get on stage is BS. Also, you need breaks between shows and there is NO reason why anyone needs to calorie restrict so bad. I just recently trained a client from Fit To Be in Your Kitchen with guidance from Ruben Sandoval and saw first hand how someone could eat more food and have less and less cardio before the show. However, you still have to be STRICT and its mentally taxing.
E: Was there an aha moment where you decided to get out of the business? D: Yeah, honestly, it was more of a political issue at the time than even a physical one. I went to a show where I was basically threatened by the organizers, it was my last show. I did not place well and I was basically being “taught a lesson”. I realized at that point, that this wasn’t even a physique contest, it was a business and one that I no longer wanted to be part of. Ironically, my body didn’t want to be part of it either.
E: What would you say to the many women who want to look like a fitness cover model? D:Looking like a cover model is an interesting goal. Sometimes I wonder what is really lying behind that goal? It is possible and attainable. Sometimes I think people just want to prove that they can do something, and I understand that. My whole life I have felt that I needed to prove that things could be done when others say they couldn’t. However, I will say that getting a cover is fleeting. Someone else is on the cover the next month. You need to have more depth and substance. If working out becomes your life to the point of missing family events, not enjoying dessert on your wedding anniversary or affecting your family life, its time to step back and see what you’re really avoiding. If you’re just wanting to be the healthiest you have been and feel great and encourage others, then, great! Just check your motives and try to live life in balance. Life is too darn short.
E: Do you think it is a realistic goal for the average woman to have if they are not competing? D: Realistic… maybe. I think so much depends on genetics. It may be very realistic for some and not at all for others. I honestly am not really sure if I think it’s a WORTHY goal. I spent 3 years so focused on my abs and how my body looked, but do you know what my goals are now? To donate as much money as I can to Big Brothers Big sisters, to volunteer with tornado clean up, to build teams of amazing women, to help people get out of debt. I think it’s a possible goal and I think goals like that give us a reason to keep working out and be healthy, but I’d like to see some deeper and more meaningful goals at this time in my life. I’d like to see us AS WOMEN have better goals. We are capable of more. What happens if you get up and can’t walk tomorrow?! (It happened to me) guess what? You won’t give two sh**s about your abs. This I promise.
E: Do you have children? What kind of message do you think bikini and figure competitions send to young girls? D: That’s a tricky question. I do not have children, but I did have a daughter, whom I gave up for adoption. I was pregnant at 15 and now she is 16.
I actually went to a “real pageant” where they had a talent and swimsuit competition and it was SO different. The suits were so modest and there were no sexy or provocative poses. When I was first “in it” I saw the “physiques” I didn’t see all the sexed up parts, but then being away and seeing the other type of pageant, my eyes were opened. I would not want my daughter to look at those types of bikini shows and aspire to be in them, however, I would support her in whatever she chose to do and I’d try and make sure she was being as healthy as possible.
E: How has your life changed since stopping competing? D:The first two years were rough. I was miserable. Sick, tired, fat, depressed, lost. I felt like a lot of my identity was wrapped up in how I looked.
Now, today, it’s better than ever. I don’t have panic attacks if I can’t work out. In fact, I can take weeks off of the gym and just be active and eat what I want and maintain my weight. I have learned to LISTEN to my body and have learned to LOVE and FORGIVE my body. I’m still heavier than where I want to be, but I’m honestly feeling more comfortable with myself than ever before. I can try new fun workouts instead of being so regimented in my schedule. I can be spontaneous and have a fit LIFESTYLE rather than be a gym rat (which there is nothing wrong with). I had to do a lot of INTERNAL work to get to where I am now and who would have ever guessed that the damage I caused would eventually be a blessing? (If you had asked me in 2010 I would have said HELL NO!!) I have really found freedom in movement and food and life in general. Parts of me regret competing but then I would not have the self-awareness that I do today.
E: How can our readers see more from/follow you? (FB/IG/Website, etc)
D: Thank you Kiki, this interview was fun…I hope it hits home with the right people
Danny-J is the owner of The Sweaty Betties: an “irreverent group of women who are looking to get fit and have a whole lot of fun along the way.”
Danny-J’s fans (The Sweaty Betties) are wildly enthusiastic about listening to someone who isn’t afraid to put some of the diet and exercise myths on blast. Danny’s passion in fitness lead her all the way through a Master’s program in Health Promotion and Exercise Science at California University of Pennsylvania. She holds numerous certifications for personal training and weight-loss and is an accomplished trainer, helping dozens of clients lose OVER 100 lbs. and helping 1,000’s of clients live healthier lives in her 8+ years training.
However, Danny-J, wasn’t always such a positive and motivational person. She had her share of struggles, being a suicidal teen, she ended up pregnant at 15 years old. She chose to place her daughter for adoption and that motivated her to start to get her act together, so she could be proud when and if she ever got to meet her child again.
She is now married to her best-friend and “Big Tattoo Muscle Man” and they live in Dallas, Texas with their two silly pups.
Q: I lost around 30lbs very quickly by doing over an hour of cardio/day, 7 days/week, and severely restricting calories. When I hit a plateau, I increased cardio further and decreased cals to lose the last 12lbs. Eventually 15 of those pounds came back. I found out about EM2WL, and began a reset, and I’ve gained a LOT of weight. Is being up 20 pounds ‘normal’? Is it normal to lift and not fit into any clothes? Am I eating too much and that’s why I feel so bloated and puffy? I’m just at a loss and feeling pretty down on myself. I’m right back where I started…
A: As much as I hate to be the messenger…yes, it is normal to be gaining weight during reset. Because you were undereating for so long, it takes a while for your body to regulate (which is why we recommend metabolism resets). When we diet using extreme caloric deficits and excessive cardio, the weight that is lost comes not merely from fat, and water, but also from muscle, joints, tendons, ligaments, and brain tissue. We also deplete our bodies of much needed vitamins and nutrients. So when we increase calories, coming from an extended period of undereating, our bodies will often first retain everything, assuming that this is merely a binge. During this period of retaining, your body is seeking to replenish the nutrient deficit, as well as balance out mineral deficiencies. As noted in the Biology of Human Starvation (see our synopsis), a period of OVERfeeding is often necessary before proper balance is restored. Because most people just starting out on a reset are petrified of eating more, this re-feed period is a bit understated. Many will only eat the bare minimum (TDEE) and often undercut/skew that amount, for fear of gaining. But recall that Dr. Keys made it clear that during a refeed, calories must be in abundance in order to rehabilitate properly. This is why many choose to use their reset as a period of bulking, to purposely overfeed and rebuild lost bone and muscle. This gives their reset purpose, and helps them to have something to focus on other than waiting for the cut.
None of this means that the reset process is exceptionally pleasant, although you will surely notice some unexpected benefits. You will feel bloating and discomfort as you retain water while your body is forced to figure out how to gather the nutrition it needs while digesting larger amounts of food properly. Once your body understands that proper nourishment is a mainstay, it will then look to replenish the areas that have been depleted. The rebuilding process is necessary and essential to your well-being. However, weight gain can be less drastic when food intake is increased slowly, and done for a much longer, realistic, time frame. Rushing the reset is often the cause of unnecessarily high weight gain, causing one to quit early, and results in an unsuccessful cut. Skipping the reset altogether is also a reason why you’ll see many struggle in the beginning of their cut.
Treat your reset as a bulk. Put those extra cals to work building muscle.
You are lifting heavier now, in addition to eating more, which will assist in rebuilding any muscle that has atrophied. Exercises that create strong muscles will also increase bone mass. Healing will always be your body’s primary goal (unfortunately, it doesn’t really care about your physique goals), although some fat loss may be happening simultaneously. As the body begins to rebuild the muscle/bone/brain tissue, etc., this will show as “gain” on the scale. But you will have so many things going on that solely judging by the scale will not give you the full story. This will seem very frustrating at first, but you will still likely notice positive changes in the mirror, pictures, and the tape measure during this time. As the rebuilding slows, you will eventually see scale movement as well.
It is most important to remember that what you are dealing with now, is what you would have dealt with anyway, the minute you tried to eat “normal” again. The fact that you are gaining weight on what should be your maintenance level calories, shows that your metabolism had completely slowed to meet the lower calorie level. This is the point of the reset. This is something that you were bound to experience, regardless. In order to keep losing, you would have kept lowering cals and slowing the metabolism further, constantly recreating your maintenance level. This means that anytime your calorie intake exceeded this level, you would gain.
So for some, the first 4-6 weeks or so may bring gain and then a gradual release as the body gains trust. But for those who have drastically undereaten for a length of time, this process can take longer. This is especially true if someone needed a reset, yet refrained from taking one (the body will attempt it’s own reset by simply resetting to the cut level calories being given). We must always remember that when we chose drastic measures to lose weight, there will be consequences. Losing the wrong “type” of weight, just for the sake of seeing the scale move, tears our body down and causes it to lose trust in us. A body that does not trust us is left to it’s own devices to nurture itself, deciding what will stay (fat) and what can go (muscle, etc). It also means that the loss was not true. When a loss is not true, it is essentially temporary, and we can typically expect to gain it all back…and more.
The #1 reason that weight gain during a metabolism reset is surprising for most of us, is because we forget that it’s only ONE phase of the journey. The Reset Phase is about healing, not fat loss (that’s a whole ‘nother phase!). For more info on the 5 phases click here.
I’ve been at cut for a little over a month and I am pleased to say that my metabolism reset was a success. I even went into cut over the Christmas holiday and woke up to a 1 lb lost the day after. This is not to say that I didn’t enjoy myself but when your cut is 2k+ you can enjoy a few more delicious bites than if it was 1200. Toward the end of my metabolism reset I started getting hungry and didn’t understand that it was my metabolism saying “Hey, I’m here and I’m awake”. It took almost 3 weeks into cut at 10% for the scale to move which kind of scared me, because again I still struggle with the microwave mentality. It doesn’t happen over night, your body is a tricky and complex machine and it tends to do what it wants to. Often times, our brains and our bodies aren’t on the same wave length, one or the other is mostly lagging behind. But once the scale started moving I was as happy as a dog with two tail. So far I’ve averaged about .5-1 lbs a week, not counting TOM and those occasional misbehaved meals.
Doing a metabolism reset was one of the best things I could have ever done for myself. It has healed so much more than my metabolism or just teaching me how to eat. My relationship with food is not that of guard and prisoner anymore. I’m in control because now I know that life doesn’t end with 1 bad food choice or giving in to my sweet tooth. When you allow yourself to eat more you are not tied so tight to those tiny portions and extreme food restrictions. Reset has also opened my eyes to all the health problems I had from eating VLCD. Lack of energy, irregularity, outrageous food cravings, dry skin, irritability, headaches and hair loss. All of these things I had no clue came from poor nutrition until I started eating. I still have chocolate cravings and honestly that craving I’ll keep, LOL after all chocolate is a required macro!!
Lifting weights is now my new love and I actually enjoy getting up in the morning to go bang some iron. My personal goal for this year is to squat and deadlift my body weight and increase upper body strength. Even with weight training I struggle with the “get there fast” thoughts in my head. I still think I should be flipping over cars and climbing buildings when I should just keep picking up heavy things and putting them down until they become too light, then pick up something heavier. I’ll be doing Xtrain soon and STS in the fall.
I never really thought that I had a eating disorder until I did my metabolism reset and began my cut. I’ve always associated eating disorders in terms of extremes i.e anorexia or bulimia. Ive never been one to extremely over eat or under eat for long periods of time (so I thought) But now that I am counting my calories and am being more accountable for what goes in my body, I now know that my eating is very disordered. There have been days that I would mentally struggle to eat 700 calories and then there are days I devour 2500 calories, all linked to how I am feeling and the level of stress. Now I understand why my weight loss yo-yo’ed for so many years, and I also understand why so many fall into these eating habits so easily and get stuck there. EM2WL has saved me in so many ways and Ive learned so much. Without their guidance I could have easily fallen into the anorexia/bulimia pool and drowned like so many, but because my relationship with food is continuously healing I haven’t. A full Metabolism Reset was one of the best things I did for myself, next to buying my first weight set. I can only speak on what I know and what I know is eating more saved ME.
If there is any doubt in your mind about increasing your calories, lifting weights, doing a metabolismreset, I challenge you to change the way you think, re-train your brain from the way we have all been taught to lose weight and give it your best. You wont regret it and your body will thank you for it.
Have an EM2WL transformation to share? Willing to let us tag along on your journey? We’d love to see it! Be featured on our Transformation/Journey page by submitting your story to Success@EM2WL.com
Q: I have a confession. Its been 3 months, I’m up 10lbs and I couldn’t have gained 10 lbs in muscle. I cannot handle this anymore, is EM2WL for everyone? I didn’t go through over a year of hard work to slowly go back to where I started. I’m trying to stay positive, I’m trying to promote EM2WL but I’m getting sick and tired of it and ready to give up. I so badly want to go back to my 1200 calorie diet and 2 hours of cardio, regardless of all the articles opposed to it.
A: Ugh! I feel your pain at seeing the scale creep up 10lbs — really, I do. It seems so contradictory, and if I were in your place (and still at the beginning of my journey) I would feel the same way, and would probably look at someone saying what I’m about to say as insane. But having lived to see the other side of it, I can tell you from experience, that 3 months is NOTHING in the grand scheme of your entire life. Especially if you want to win this battle once and for all.
But, as for troubleshooting the gain (which I’m sure is the only part of this that you’ll even WANT to hear, lol):
How much cardio are you doing?
What types of workouts are you doing, and have the workouts been the same the whole time, or changed?
When was the last time you took a rest week?
Are you weighing yourself under the same conditions every time (couple days off of lifting, moderate sodium, etc?)
Is there something in your diet, in particular, that has increased that could be causing extra bloat water retention (dairy, wheat, gluten, etc)?
I know how frustrating it can be. It took me so many months before my body got back on the right track, that I’d pretty much given up, too. And not trying to scare you off, but…I gained back every.single.pound that I’d lost up until then.
Straight up.
This is not always gonna be a numbers game, and you may not always be able to “explain away” everything that happens on the scale. There are always so many variables, that honestly, you shouldn’t even try. Trying to make sense of every single pound that is away from a certain number will drive you insane. Personally, I know that I can hold up to 10lbs of water weight, at any given hormonal moment. I would love for it to only be 2-3 like some ladies, but I just don’t get that kinda luck. We are all about the real deal here. I’m not gonna sugar coat it and say to that you may not keep that 10lbs or that all the weight is gonna magically fly off. I’m also not saying that it won’t happen, either. But I will say that stressing about it will literally make the problem worse, while not changing the logistics of what must take place here.
This is a mental battle. All mental. If you can stay strong in MIND, the rest can, will, and DOES fall in to place.
A few things to realize:
1) I’m exactly the same size that I was at my “fattest.”Right now. But I’m about 5 sizes smaller, and look 10xs better (if I do say so myself, lol)
2) We tend to get frantic when we start “gaining” during our reset and such, but typically any weight that is gained during the reset is the EXACT amount that you will gain ANYWAY, regardless of if you rode out 1200 cals until goal or did the reset. That’s because if you ride out 1200 cals, get to “goal” then start eating normal, your body will still have the same reaction. Much better for your body to do the adjusting NOW, and see what you’re really working with, than to be deceived by the false sense of security that low cals gives. Most people don’t understand that when dieting, they would need to actually go 5-10 lbs below what they think goal is, because once they get to “goal” they have to allow for weight fluctuations that happen to EVERYONE when they get there. Check out the difference in the weights of former Biggest Loser Contestants. How many stay at the exact weight that they “ended” with?
3) If you do drop back to 1200, then hit a plateau before getting to goal, what do you do? Drop even lower? That is just so unhealthy, and I would pray that you would not let the scale have that much dominion over you. I know that it’s hard to get to that point, mentally, where you don’t care what the scale says, but it really cannot be your only dictator.
4) Studies have shown a very strong link between delaying gratification and success in life, so look at the ways that this journey will help you in ALL areas of life, not just how you look on the beach this summer. How’s that for multi-tasking?
“Going back can sometimes be the quickest way forward.” C.S. Lewis
EM2WL is a lifestyle, not a “one-size-fit-all” set of rules. We often leave many areas “gray” when discussing the process (Paleo? Gluten free? Vegan? Intermittent Fasting? etc), because we want to encourage everyone, as individuals, to seek how to make the journey “theirs.” Recently, we received a Journey testimonial, that we felt was a perfect example of this. In fact, we loved Krystal’s story so much that we’ve invited her back to discuss how she — determined to fix her own metabolism — adapted EM2WL to her lifestyle, with great success.
EM2WL – How I Made It Work For Me
Krystal Kretschmer
We are all different and we all need different things. But we all try the same approach to weight loss: eat less, exercise more, lose weight.
Fail.
I did this and it destroyed my health (little by little so I was relatively unaware as time went on and it worsened), and not only that, it made it harder for me after the fact, to be healthy and not gain back tons of fat.
This goes out to anyone who has done restricted calorie diets, high calorie deficits and effectively ruined their metabolism. The idea that “People who have been obese in their life, will need to live on a permanently calorie restricted diet in order to not gain back fat,” is NOT TRUE and doesn’t need to be preached. It is upsetting, defeating and it’s an unhealthy principle that does not need to be adhered to!
The more you eat, the healthier you are, simply because:
more food = more nutrients
I’m am not saying ‘eat more calories’ necessarily (but I am, just not to excess). More so, I am trying to say, ‘eat more nutrients’ and ‘eat more quality food’ to be healthy. Eat as much as you can and still remain true to your goals.
When I realized that I was living on 1600 calories and burning 3200 calories every day, for months and years (I never thought I burned that much so I thought my deficit was much smaller), I realized that that was just incredibly wrong. That was not healthy. I was suffering, unaware. I had adapted to the side effects that crept on over the years (bad moods, losing energy, poor workouts and an inability to progress) and just wasn’t aware of how much my health was being affected. I knew then that I needed to eat more. I was scared because if I was eating this little and not gaining or losing (and I was still trying to lose, for years, with no success – I couldn’t eat less, I lived with a permanent plateau) then surely if I consumed more calories I would gain weight, no?
NO! I believe that I avoided fat building by building muscle instead which has the added effect of increasing your metabolism with the more muscle mass you build. Eating more calories also means an increase in metabolic activity. I felt all of this as weeks passed and I began to feel better and better, and then just absolutely great!
When I decided to start eating more, I had to console the part of my brain that truly believed that eating with a deficit was the only way (the part of me that had lived like that for years and years and years). I really just wanted to repair my metabolism and everything I read suggested eating more. To me, it seemed logical that if I had adapted to fewer calories, that more calories WOULD turn into fat and I obviously didn’t want that. Many other articles suggested that the second best way to increase your metabolism was to increase your muscle mass. So, those two principles in hand seemed a fitting pair! Also, everything I read said that it is next to impossible to put on muscle with a calorie debt. So, I decided I needed to change my focus from losing weight, to eating more and building muscle.
I researched body building and learned a few key things, for example:
EAT MORE PROTEIN Most sources suggest eating about 0.5g of protein per pound of body weight. I eat between 0.5 and 0.75g per pound. Don’t limit your (healthy) carbs, and I say this ONLY because eating that much protein means you are naturally going to cut your carbs anyway or else you would eat far too many calories. Initially, I went protein crazy and was eating too much protein and not enough complex carbs and I got, um, backed up, if you know what I mean. This may not ring true for everyone. I needed to increase my carb intake a bit and stuck strictly with complex carbs for ‘bowel regularity’, lol. Fibre keeps the system running efficiently and we want that for sure!
ZIGZAG YOUR CALORIES Every day eat a different amount of NET calories. And I have higher calorie days on my harder workout days. Also, I try to eat the majority of my calories before and after my workout. Before, so you can fuel an awesome, intense workout, and after to help repair and build muscle. Try to eat protein and complex carbs within 30 minutes of a good muscle-burning workout. When I say zigzag, I love this philosophy because plateaus are all about our body ADAPTING to our lifestyle. We need to keep it guessing. I ate a constant 1600 every day for ages and my body knew it and worked according to that. Increasing my calories and eating, say, 3000 one day, 2700 the next, 3200 the day after, 3000 the next, 2600 the day after, etc.. And TIMING those calories so my body has more calories to fuel workouts and become stronger, means that I am now telling MY BODY what I want it to do with those calories, and that is not to store them for later!
The key with zigzagging is accuracy with numbers. I have a Body Media Fit armband which measures my caloric burn (95% accurately which is good enough for me) down to the minute. Most people use estimations to calculate their burns, or notoriously inflated machines that over-estimate your burns by hundreds of calories or more (I’ve seen this first hand, not once has a cardio machine ever underestimated my burns). For many, it would be far easier to stick with a static calorie goal every day rather than jump around, and if this works for you, then by all means, stick with what works for you! The concept of zigzagging is a valid philosophy, but again, honesty and accuracy are required.
SLEEP ENOUGH This is the predominant time that our body uses to build muscle. Make sure it has that chance
QUALITY AND QUANTITY With increased calorie output, our need for nutrients (the building blocks for creating new cells, i.e. muscle fibre) also increases. If you suspect at all, that you are not getting enough nutrients (and this can be possible with even the best of diets, because of day-to-day differences) then maybe consider a multivitamin. Take half in the morning, half at night because we can only use about that much at a time and after about 12 hours we’ve used up all that half-pill has to offer. If we’re going to build, we need the tools to do it, not just the energy.
If you are coming out of a high calorie deficit, implement your changes/increases slowly. I increased my calories by about 400 every couple of weeks and took a full 6 weeks to get up to my maintenance eating levels (around 3000 in and out per day, less on rest days but still aiming for balance with calories in, calories out). Zigzagging all the way!
You can’t change one single aspect of your lifestyle without compensating elsewhere. If you keep burning calories the same way throughout your day, you keep exercising the same and eating the same (just more), then your body is going to think “Everything’s the same, and I have more calories! Great! Let’s store these for later!” Boom, FAT.
If you outsmart your body and tell it you want to build muscle, not fat, and you feed it calories in order to work harder at the gym, and feed it after to repair and build the tissue it just micro-tore to pieces, the your body thinks “Oh, we are doing things differently. We need to be stronger so the next time we do this I don’t get so broken.” And boom, MUSCLE.
I wanted reassurance from my body that I was building muscle and not fat. Initially, I gained a couple of pounds, which I expected but didn’t like. I stuck with it. The reassurance came from a few feelings:
DOMSDelayed Onset Muscle Soreness is a good pain we feel 24-48 hours after a good workout. It will be felt in the muscles that got worked the most and that is exactly where you will build more tissue. When we work our muscles hard, we tear them up a bit (in a microscopic way) and when we rebuild them, they get built back strong and a bit bigger. Over time, this effect exponentially increases our muscle mass and we grow.
ENERGY I felt I had more energy to put into workouts. I could work harder and longer. This was something that declined for me with a low-calorie diet and my workouts suffered and plateaued. My progress in the gym halted.
POST WORKOUT With a calorie deficit, I began to get very, very grumpy after workouts for about half an hour. I was so irritable and angry, even during my workouts. When I increased my calorie, this feeling subsided completely and I left the gym with a smile on my face again.
PROGRESS A few weeks into increasing my calories, I FINALLY was able to increase my weights at the gym, for the first time in months, even years. I am currently lifting more than I ever have. A couple of weeks later, I was able to increase again. Obviously, I was building muscle and getting stronger. This was one of the greatest reassurances I have had.
Measure your success with feelings as much as possible. Numbers are not going to tell you most of what you want to know, especially short term. In 45 days, it looks like I lost about 10 or 15 pounds, but I gained 0.88 pounds realistically, by building muscle and losing fat. My measurements didn’t change either. A photograph was all it took to make my hard work and success glaringly obvious. But still, during those 45 days, I stuck with my plan because I was feeling better, stronger and progressing.
And vice versa, if you feel worse, you feel you have no energy, you feel cranky after or during workouts, you feel like you’re not progressing at the gym… If you feel poorly about any aspect of your lifestyle, try to find another way to your goals. There is always more than one road to success, though they are all paved with failures. We learn from our mistakes. Embrace them. As long as you stay the course, you will get there eventually. Keep your health and well-being at the front of it all and you will find health and happiness now and at the end, and you will enjoy your life now and now ‘when you get there. A quick, unhealthy fix to your weight issues will abandon you in the end and your hard work will have damaged you in the process, mentally and physically. I was there, and I’m never going back. Aim for a sustainable change, live the way you want to live the rest of your life and who wants to live with less than they should forever?
I have been on this lifestyle journey for 11 years now. I have tried high-calorie deficit diets twice and yes, I did lose weight. But, I also plateaued far above my goal each time and struggled, basically for 11 years, to get to the physical, mental and healthy state that I want to be in. More importantly, high calorie deficits work short term for weight loss, but they are not the only (or necessary) way. Nor are they the healthiest option. My health declined while living this way, I regained weight when I ‘returned to life’ and I never achieved what I set out to achieve in the first place. High calorie deficits failed me. Realizing that there is a healthy way to tone and sculpt this body, lose fat and feel great is something I wish I had known 11 years ago, but it’s never to late and this journey will never end. I truly love this lifestyle, it’s not restrictive, it’s liberating. To feel normal, to eat normally, for the first time in my entire life, is absolutely gripping and I can’t wait to see what tomorrow brings!
I cannot say this enough: We are all different. Our individual body is a composition of millions of different variables that all work together to create the human being that you are. What works for one person will likely never be the exact formula for someone else. Over the last 11 years, no one ever helped me or coached me. I searched for information and kept learning so I could understand the human body and dieting and lifestyles. I compiled knowledge, tried different things, I stuck with what worked and tried something new when results wore thin. If anything, I hope to bestow some information on someone that unlocks the next step to success, because that’s all I ever wanted for myself. When the pieces came together in just the right way, all the mistakes and struggles became worth it.
Coach your body and support it as though it is someone else with a mind of its own. It has good intentions for you, but there’s a disconnect between our wants and its wants. Work with it, not against it, find the balance and you will find your success!
Thanks SO much for sharing the key elements in your success, Krystal! We look forward to hearing more as your journey progresses!
We hope that this encourages everyone to do the research and spend this time on your journey learning as much as you can about your body. That’s what the process is all about. When you become the expert of YOU, there’s no stopping you! How have you made EM2WL work for you?
My name is Kelly, and I have been overweight my entire life. As a child, I can remember my grandmother offering me a dollar for every pound I lost. My mother offering me contact lenses instead of glasses to lose the weight. I can even remember in grade 7, a very cruel man at a horse stable, watching me struggle to get on a horse during a class trip, who decided to yell out for all to hear, “Jesus, how much do you weight? 200 pounds?? You might kill my horse!” It was probably one of the most embarrassing moments of my life, and unfortunately something still ingrained in my head.
I have never ridden a horse since.
I spent the better part of my young life overweight, unhealthy, unhappy and miserable. I had my wake up call when I was 24 years old. I woke up in the middle of the night with heart palpitations, sweating and short of breath. I knew this was my sign to change my life and get healthy, once and for all. It was shortly after, a Weight Watchers At Work program began in my office, and I immediately signed up. Over the next 5 years, I slowly lost the weight. By the time my wedding hit in the spring of 2007, I had lost 102 pounds, going from a size 24 to a size 14. I was very much the beautiful bride, something I am very proud to look back on and know how hard I worked for it. True, I was not yet at goal, but I was something I had never been before.. Average size. I still had about 30 pounds left to lose according to the scale, and I was hoping to get a bit more of it off before we took the plunge and had kids.
5 months later, I was pregnant with our first child. It was like a light switch went off in my head and I turned off the weight loss capabilities and just slacked on the eating. Now granted, I was not eating poorly overall, but I was eating more than I had been allowed on Weight Watchers. During the course of my pregnancy I had gained 70 pounds back – Something that shamed me, made me feel horrible and ugly once more and made me hate the last few weeks of my pregnancy. After the birth of my first, I hit that 6 week mark and immediately went back to the WW program. I spent the next 18 months trying desperately to lose the baby weight. I managed to get to about 25 pounds away from my pre-pregnancy weight before I was pregnant again. This time I paid more attention to my eating, continued working out at the gym and watching everything. I had managed to make it almost half way through the pregnancy, before I had to stop going to the gym. Over the last 20 weeks of my pregnancy, I still somehow managed to gain about 45 pounds. It just seemed to be even eating a little bit more than I was used to, was causing me huge gains.
Needless to say, It wouldn’t be until almost 18 months after my second child’s birth, that I finally understood WHY I struggled so much to keep the weight off during pregnancy, and why it has been so hard to get it off a second and third time.
In January of 2012, I decided to try the C25K program as a way to hopefully boost my fledgling weight loss efforts. I was once again back at Weight Watchers and still could not get anywhere on the weight loss front. In 8 weeks I went from running barely 30 seconds, to running a full 5k (40 mins for me:)) It was probably one of the few things as an adult I was proud I had done for myself. I never wanted to be a runner, but I wanted to prove to myself I could do it. And now I do enjoy it. During my training, I was barely eating my weekly flex points, let alone the 54 activity points I was earning in a week. I could always hear my leader in the back of my head saying I needed to eat more, but for some reason, I could never connect it in my brain. It was during this time that I realized I had an account on MFP, and decided to give it another try, as another way of tracking my food, get a different outlook on things.
In my first week looking through the forums, I came across the Eat More to Weigh Less Group. I was curious how they could eat so much and still lose the weight, so I decided to read the posts they had listed, ask questions and get a different look on weight loss. I think it took me a few days to convince myself I needed to eat more, even though I knew on WW, I was not eating enough. I began by taking my WW tracker and plugged a week into MFP and see what the calories were like. I was SHOCKED to see I was barely eating about 1400 calories a day. I found the online calculators and was even more shocked to see that my body needed at least 1800 calories, just to pump blood in my body.I immediately started eating at my BMR level and saw the scale drop. Over the course of the next few weeks, I read and re-read and re-read the stickies, asked questions and started to trust the process. I jumped up to my 15% cut value and once again saw the scale change for me. It was here that my body decided it wasn’t quite ready to forgive me for my past eating issues. I spent about 6 weeks trying to understand why I was stalling out and nothing was happening. Then I read about the Metabolism Reset.
The metabolism reset meant taking a break from losing weight, allowing myself to eat and gain strength, and then start making a cut down the road. It terrified me! I have been in weight loss mode for almost 10 years. I knew nothing about stopping that process. Even while pregnant, all I could think about was how the heck was I going to lose the weight? Then it hit me.
I had been in a very low calorie diet for the better part of ten years. No wonder my body wasn’t convinced I was feeding it enough. No wonder my body wasn’t allowing the weight to come off when I breastfed my children, and beyond. No wonderI couldn’t get the scale to cooperate in my favor at all. Once I finally allowed myself to let go, and trust the process, I was finally able to start to heal myself.
The metabolism reset itself has been filled with many ups and downs. I started off very skeptical. How was eating even more supposed to help me lose the weight?? But that first week I jumped to my TDEE value, I lost 3 pounds.Over the course of the next few weeks, those pounds did come back and stabilized, but I realized, it didn’t bother me. I knew now that I could eat literally DOUBLE the amount of food I was eating almost 4 months ago, and basically stay the same weight. I originally planned to only go to 4 weeks on the reset, but after hitting the wall at this point, I knew I needed to give it a full 8 in order to heal my mind more than my body.
Here I am. Currently on my final week of my Metabolism Reset and rarin’ to go. In the last 4 months of fueling my body I have had significant changes in my life and appearance for the better. My hair stopped falling out. I sleep better. I am not as grumpy or angry with others. I started lifting weights and can lift things I never thought I could do. I can do REAL pushups!!! I smile more. I am happier. I feel better about my life. I can’t say the cutting process will be easy, but I am looking forward to the changes coming my way. But no matter what, I now know I will never eat so little calories again. I deserve to feel this good. I deserve to be happy, and I deserve to never have to utter the word “Diet” again.
I hope the next few months will show some wonderful results!
Lifting weights is now my new love and I actually enjoy getting up in the morning to go bang some iron. My personal goal for this year is to squat and deadlift my body weight and increase upper body strength. Even with weight training I struggle with the “get there fast” thoughts in my head. I still think I should be flipping over cars and climbing buildings when I should just keep picking up heavy things and putting them down until they become too light, then pick up something heavier. I’ll be doing 
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