You’ll never guess how she did it!
How Laura lost 100 lbs in 12 months!
If you’ve ever tried to lose weight you know it’s NOT easy. We start off great and shortly after something happens that throws us off, we slip and have a hard time getting back on track… we struggle for a bit and decide to put the whole “Lose Weight” goal on the back burner for a few more months. Losing weight is hard. Progress is at best slow and it takes NOT ONLY education and knowledge about exercise and nutrition, it also requires a degree of consistency and discipline that is hard to develop and maintain. You can’t rush the process, there are lessons along the way that you need to learn, otherwise the weight will come right back.
If you read the title of this post and thought “I wonder how she did it? How the hell did she lose 100 lbs?” Well now is your chance… go for it. Guess. No, really… go for it!…. Give up? ok. She lost 100 lbs by eating right and working out! – WHAT?!! You were expecting something different?! Some magic secret? Extract from a newly discovered plant in the Amazon? A new 10 minute workout that melts fat away? Isagenix?! Fuck!!! Ok ok… sorry. I’ll try to be nicer.
Laura has lost 100lbs in 12 months and that’s a LOT of hard work right there. 100lbs – Is a nice round number that always marks a huge milestone for anyone with that much weight to lose. It makes you seriously stop and look back at EVERYTHING that had to happen to make that possible. In this post I’ll share with you the specific path that Laura followed in order to achieve losing 100 lbs in 12 months staying clear of fad diets, without even giving up any of her favourite foods.
A little over a year ago Laura realized that her outside (her body) didn’t properly reflect who she was in the inside. Something needed to change and not knowing where to start she looked online for a facility that could offer guidance and allow her to focus on herself and nothing else.
Laura started her journey with 4 weeks at Hilton Head Health in the US, a Wellness and Weight loss retreat Spa Resort like experience.
She started there the 2nd week of July 2015.
Once she was there she emailed me:
——— Original Message ———
Hi MiguelSorry this took so long. i wanted to see how i would do in my program.
Apparently I am doing very well. I have been at Hilton Head Health
for the past 2.5 weeks. I am in the Lose Well Program. I am worked
out by trainers 2 x a day, plus a whole lot of other stuff. When i
started I was so intimidated by it, but now…bring it on. Go check
out their website to see an amazing program!I have had a fitness assessment and health assessment when i entered the program and it will be done again when I leave. i will bring it to
you so you will have some idea of what i am capable of.When i am home. I have a full time job. The only limitations I have
are time. I go on holidays in Dec/Jan and i hate paying for things I
don’t use. I am thinking I would like a work out program twice a
week. Tuesdays and Thursdays. After what I have seen here, morning,
before work workouts seem to work best for me.so what i am looking for is Tuesday and Thursday morning, starting at
6:30 or 7:00. I may also be looking to add a Sunday workout (but not
in the morning) in a couple of months .I would like to start the first tuesday i get home. I think that is
August 19??? (I dont have a calendar in front of me)Can you give me an idea of what you can offer me in this time frame,
the cost and the locations.Thanks so muchLaura –Here is my response:On Aug 4, 2015, at 2:03 PM, miguel@dpfitness.ca wrote:Hi Laura,I am very happy to hear you’re enjoying the challenge. It definitely sounds like a great program.I agree that it’s important to keep the momentum going as soon as you come back.There are 2 main ways to train with us, group workouts or 1-on-1 workouts.Regardless of which way you want to train with us, you can put your membership on hold for 30 to 90 days per calendar year, which means you wouldn’t have to pay for the time you’re away 😉Right now, that time slot you mention: Tuesday/Thursday at 7:00 am is available for 1 on 1 training.If you prefer to do group classes we don’t have a class at 7:00, but we have a class at 6:00-6:45 am those days.1 on 1 TrainingThe minimum commitment is 3 months, in monthly payments of course.Each session is $75 and you save $50 when you buy 10 sessions at once. This means for $700you’d be covered until September 17th at 2 sessions/week, on the day of your last paid session you’d pay your next 10. At the end of the 3 month commitment you can decide to continue on month to month or switch to group classes.Group ClassesThe most popular package is a 12 month commitment at $175/month. It gives you access to up to 3 workouts per week. You get a Carb Cycling Meal Plan, along with tracking of progress and body fat percentage, etc, etc. If you chose to do the group classes you’re required to pay your last month in advance + the first month’s payment.It’s important for your transformation that we carry on from wherever you left off while on your current program. You’re coming back to “Real life” with all it’s challenges and temptations and I’m happy to hear you want to keep your momentum going strong!If you want to check out more information, testimonials, etc, please go here: www.dpfitness.caWhat do you think would work best for you 1-on-1 or group training?Miguel-Her response:On 2015-08-04 12:20, Laura wrote:
HiI’m leaning really strongly towards one on one for the first 3 months.Also I know I will be away one of the Thursdays. Will that be a problem?I have to go to my next work out. I will pull out a calendar when I get
back to my room tonight and email u then.Please hold that time slot fo me!!!
Thanks so much,
Laura
Sent from my iPhone
She arrived to Hilton Head Health at 274.5 lbs and in that first month she lost a total of 20 lbs which is amazing by itself. She learnt about healthy cooking, and how to make delicious low calorie meals, which would definitely prove useful later on. She received her initial and final assessment from them. We started the Tuesday after she came back to town, literally right away!
1st Session together
She came in through the door with a smile on her face. I went over her assessment and explained to her she was no longer at a wellness/weight loss retreat, this was real life and with that came work, family, friends and many other distractions, obstacles and temptations that she hadn’t had to deal with while she was away. Taking into consideration her work, hobbies, activity and workout schedule I calculated her Calorie and Macronutrient requirements and taught her how to accurately track her food using her phone. We started at 1500 calories per day, which is twice as much food as some “weight loss” regimes or fad diets suggest. This would allow for a more sustainable approach to weight loss in terms of nutrition, while supporting everything we were about to put her body through!
The 1st Workout
I pushed her hard… During this session I asked her questions about herself, about how she saw herself, what she tought of herself, her relationship with family members, etc. These are tough questions to answer, if the person is ready and willing to go to those dark places the answers often allow us to discover emotions deep within ourselves that have been holding us back, repeating certain behavioural patterns because “That’s who I am” or “That’s how it’s always been!” – Within 20 minutes (thanks to ball slams 😉 ) we discovered a major block in who she taught she was NOT. She had grown up thinking that she was never as good as… someone else. Always trying to prove her worth in an effort to feel valued. This is often a bottomless pit… because regardless of what she did, she never felt she mattered enough to certain people.
The workout ended with her laying on the parking lot catching her breath. “You did Great!” I said. She replied: “I knew I needed to work really hard to show you that I am worthy of having a Personal Trainer” – I stopped her right there and said: “You have to stop that! You are doing to yourself the exact same thing that was done to you since you were a kid. You have nothing to prove! Not to me! You are Worth it. Period! Not because of how well you did during this workout… you deserve a Healthy, Happy, Strong body. Period!”
Laura’s Plan
Laura went on to work out twice per week in a private 1 on 1 with myself. Our sessions are 60 minutes long from beginning to end, Tuesdays and Thursdays at 7 am. At first we started just working out her whole body in each session, this would allow for less overload per specific muscle group to let her body get used to the demands we would be putting it through later on. Besides this, she had to do some sort of light activity 3 times per week, usually just walks as she couldn’t run quite yet. One of the main misconceptions is that in order to progress, and achieve results, you need to shock your body, and for this you need to try very different things all the time. This isn’t true… I can tell you for a fact I don’t know anyone that has bounced around from trainer to trainer, from gym to gym, from pilates to spinning to bootcamp…. and has achieved these kind of results. That’s because Consistency is the key! You need the work ethic to get it done, of course but you also need to find someone who knows what they’re doing so they can guide you in the process.
Food & Drinks
I needed to make sure she was eating enough to fuel her body through it all. Two workouts with me, 3 walks,dragon boat practice, etc… So I asked her to use what she had learnt in terms of cooking healthy low calorie meals and portion control and step it up a bit more. This meant tracking her food with MyFitness Pal to make sure she was eating 1500 calories per day. I didn’t tell her what to eat, I taught her How to eat. How to make decisions based on the guidelines to make sure she consumed enough Protein to support her muscles, enough healthy Fats to keep her joints healthy and enough Carbohydrates to keep her energy levels up throughout the day! Anybody can give you “a meal plan” in fact you can download hundreds of free meal plans online, but what happens when you either get bored of those foods or you are just unable to eat something from that list? How do you make a decision if you need to improvise and eat out for example. Learning how to eat and why, the effects of different foods in your body, mood and state of mind is extremely important when it comes to losing weight in an enjoyable and sustainable way. If Laura felt like having chocolate, ice cream, a beer, pasta, you name it…. she could have it. In fact she did! She would just make sure she tracked it and that it was within the guidelines I gave her!
Laura felt great on 1500 calories, not too little, not too much food and it definitely keep the scale moving down. We weighed in once per week on Tuesday mornings. She continued steadily losing 1 to 2.5 lbs per week. Immediately after the weigh in I would say “You lost weight, great!.. How did you feel this week?” This would allow us to monitor and make sure she wasn’t struggling with hunger or feelings of deprivation. In this way we continued for the next 4 months or so, then one day she came in and she wasn’t very happy…
She came in and said something like this: “Look, Food isn’t a problem for me. I feel like I can handle it just fine. I can cook 2 different meals for me and my family every day, I am ok with eating something different than them and staying away from all the treats they eat. I can do that, and it doesn’t affect me. But I wish I could just, for one night even… have a few drinks… actually… more than a few drinks. I want to just not have to worry about how many calories I have left!” So for the next 5 days we “saved” 150 calories each day… this would create a bit of a buffer so that on Saturday she could just relax and have as many drinks as she wanted and get it out of her system… and believe me she got it out of her system alright! The next day she came for a workout, let’s just say that was an interesting workout… lol (see picture to the right)! See it’s all about balance, we are all human and we will all struggle and slip from time to time, that’s fine… it’s completely normal! Those who learn to pick themselves up and get back at it are the ones that succeed!
Progressing
As Laura continued to lose weight and get stronger we’ve changed things up a bit. She eats more ( about 1700 calories/day) and she is down to only a couple light jogs outside the gym… why? because she is approaching her maintenance phase. When you’ve lived with such an intense focus on losing weight for this long it can be scary to move away from that and know how to maintain. We sat down for a whole session and instead of working out, I showed her exactly how I would calculate how much she would need to eat in order to maintain her weight when she got to her goal weight, based on the level of activity that she would like to maintain in the future. It’s not about always working out more and more in order to make sure you don’t gain weight back… she literally told me what she’d like her life to look like, how many times per week she would like to exercise and I used that information to show her what her Maintenance phase would look like.
Yeah but How much?
Hiring a Personal Trainer isn’t cheap, it’s usually somewhere around $50-60 per hour, sometimes more. Our 1 on 1 rate is $75/hour. At 2 sessions per week, she’s been paying about $600-$650 per month, so it’s definitely not cheap by any means. Multiply that by the 11 months that she’s been with me and she’s paid a total of $7,150. I completely understand that this is a lot of money and that you may not even be remotely close to being able to afford this… the good news is: You don’t have to. It is by no means REQUIRED to hire a personal trainer, hell… even hiring a personal trainer won’t mean anything if you are not willing to work hard and commit to the process. Someone told me once, “I thought that working 1-on-1 just meant the weight was going to start falling off just like that”. I laughed! Nothing could be farther from the truth.
Most people don’t even need to have private training sessions with a personal trainer on a weekly basis. A personal trainer won’t make shit happen for you. I certainly didn’t make this happen for Laura. She did it herself, thats precisely why It feels so DAMN good for her to have achieved this!
Pardon my Mexican
Whether you’d like to lose 20, 50, 100 pounds or more… understand one thing: YOU ARE HUMAN. That means you are not perfect, you are not meant to be perfect. There’s going to be ups and downs, you’re going to be excited at first and then there’ll be times when you don’t feel like putting in the work, or tracking your food. At one point or another you’re going to screw up, you will struggle… and that’s OK. You, like Laura and so many of our amazing people at Driven Performance are STRONG in every sense of the word… look at everything you’ve had to go through so far!
You can always go one more round, and even when you think you can’t, I dare you to attempt it… don’t think just get. back. up. I guarantee you have it in you!
Defeat, my friend, isn’t final until you decide to stay down!
The only way to be absolutely certain that you won’t FAIL is to never really attempt anything BIG… and (pardon my Mexican but) that’s a fucking waste of a life! Let Laura be a source of inspiration to prove that if you put your head down and commit to yourself, fully, deeply and without reservations AMAZING things can happen!
Yes, you could say Laura is a great success story but you know what? Way before it was anything close to that, this was the story of a woman that decided to change her life. It has been a story of a woman’s unshakeable determination, dedication, early mornings, lots of runs, healthy eating, yoga, taking care of her body and a lot of hard fucking work… That’s what it takes to Transform. It’s not a decision you make with your head, you decide with your heart. #dontgiveup #strongertogether
-Miguel Diaz