A Dietitian’s Take on the TOP 5 Most Searched Topics for Women on a Weight Loss Journey

These are the 5 topics women search for the most on their journey to lose weight and my thoughts about them:

1) Meal Delivery Service:

Personally, I’ve tried a couple: Hello Fresh, and Factor- with a preference for the latter. (No, I am not sponsored. But if the team at Factor reads this, hit me up!)

Pros- I love that Factor is created by a team of Chefs and Dietitians. The meals are delicious and there are a few different cuisines to choose from, including Mexican and Indian! The Nutrition Facts shows you exactly what goes into each meal and how many calories and macros are in each. They are typically high in fiber and protein which I appreciate, being on my own weight loss journey as a postpartum mom. They’re easy to order and easy to pause or cancel and frequently have deals going on for discounted boxes. They have a rewards program and a referral program as well, so it’s easy to get the most bang for your buck. You can also choose your box size and tailor your meals to your dietary needs. I personally tried the different keto options, protein options, desserts, and breakfasts. The keto empanadas were surprisingly delicious! I love that I could have a different meal every day and they are so easy to use- simply refrigerate until ready to eat, vent the top, and microwave for 2 minutes. Since there is no cooking or cleaning, I especially loved using these during the first couple months of postpartum! If you are too busy to grocery shop, prep, and cook, these are super convenient and take up minimal fridge space. They are an amazing alternative for fast food or delivery because it’s cheaper and healthier. Yes- cheaper than a typical fast-food meal! I also like to use these for work lunches- just make sure you have access to a fridge or have ice packs in an insulated bag, and a microwave. Don’t forget your fork!

Cons- The one negative I noticed- there was a lot of cauliflower rice and cauliflower mashed “potatoes” in the keto meals. I wish they had more brussels, cabbage, asparagus, and green beans etc. (They do have these, just not as much as the cauliflower substitutes). And this is just me being nit-picky, but- the packaging is a bit cumbersome, especially if you live in a 3rd story apartment like myself. It is for safety reasons though, which I really appreciate the company taking very seriously. The boxes are insulated with recycled fibers and there is either dry ice (if you have frozen meals) or giant ice packs with biodegradable filling.

2) Weight Loss Medications: (you know the ones)

There is a time and a place for these. I think these may be beneficial for some, such as micro-dosing for menopausal women or people with certain disease characteristics, (comment below if you want me to elaborate on this in a future post!) but are overused in the current market, especially given the range of negative side effects many experience as a result. I believe they should only be used sparingly, as a secondary short-term tool, alongside primary long-term sustainable changes in diet, exercise, and coaching. These medications are heavily advertised right now, which is leading many to flock to it as a “magic cure” for “instant weight loss”. Unfortunately, I see way too many individuals relying on these medications without changing their lifestyle! Or they are being prescribed these medications without the proper education and follow-up regarding nutrition and lifestyle changes (physicians need to be accountable too). Individuals may lose some weight in the beginning, but it’s not sustainable. Dosages may need to be doubled at a certain point and the side effects are very unpleasant. Please make sure if you take these, you are being properly monitored by a physician and receive counseling/ coaching to instill healthy habits (diet and exercise) into your life.

3) Evening Habit Adjustments:

In my opinion? Super underrated. Getting a good night’s sleep is crucial to regulating your hormones, such as the ones that signal for hunger and cravings. If we aren’t properly rested, we are way more likely to go for that donut full of “quick energy” than a satiating omelet full of protein that will keep us fuller longer, and with more stable blood sugars.

Tips:

• Set a bedtime and do your best to stick to it. It helps to have a routine and to get things ready for the next day (i.e., set out your clothes, supplements, pack your lunch, etc).

• Timing of caffeine. Note that caffeine has a half-life of 4-6 hours! This means it could take roughly 10 hours for caffeine to leave your system- adjust your intake accordingly. I know that midday coffee is tempting… but maybe stick to water or electrolytes! If you use pre-workout later in the day, consider a non-stim/ stimulant-free variety.

• Limit your screen time at night. If you’re someone who needs the TV to fall asleep at night, or need to scroll on your phone to unwind, now is the time to consider other options. Talk to a sleep specialist if you need to. Personally, I don’t even have a TV in my room, and my phone screen changes color depending on the time of day. Still, I try not to be on my phone after I set my alarm for the morning and stick to reading, journaling, or praying right before bed.

• Try not to worry- tomorrow has its own troubles. Reflect on the day you had today and thank God for all the blessings you got to experience- even if it was just waking up! Gratitude and Biblical affirmations can go a long way when you are feeling stressed and overwhelmed. If that doesn’t work- try writing either a mental list or a list in your planner/notebook of all the things you want to get done tomorrow. A sound machine or app is also a great tool.

• Magnesium supplement- Most people are deficient in magnesium. I like Bioptimizers brand because it’s a mix of different types of magnesium. However, you could likely benefit from just a magnesium glycinate which will also help your muscles to relax. Be sure to talk to your provider before starting any new supplements.

4) Intuitive Eating:

To be honest, I don’t trust this method if you are starting out on your weight loss journey. Don’t get me wrong- you should definitely slow down while you eat and see if you can listen to your hunger and fullness cues and be mindful when it comes to eating. Savor your food. Enjoy it. However, with “intuitive eating” no foods are “off-limits”, and this ignores the fact that a lot of foods are designed by food manufacturers to be addictive- combining salty, sweet, and fatty flavors to get us to eat more and more without ever feeling full. I think it is perfectly safe and good to have some foods off-limits. If you want to be more intuitive, consider making a log of how different foods make you feel physically. For instance, I feel bloated and sluggish after a meal full of pasta or bread. I get severe GI distress after having something containing maltitol, the sugar alcohol. Track these symptoms in a food diary and try limiting or omitting the ones that are making you sick and tired.

5) Fitness Accessories:

Personally, I use and love Beach Body programs (BODi), ZOZOfit, and Cronometer. These all have phone app options.

BODi- Does P90X or Turbo Jam ring a bell? That’s Beachbody. They have different membership options available. If you have limited equipment and want to workout from home- this is for you. There are a ton of programs to choose from and you can filter them based on your goals, the trainer you want, equipment available, how many minutes per day/days per week, length of programming, etc. I personally keep going back to 80 Day Obsession and LIIFT4 but I have dabbled in quite a few others!

ZOZOfit- Zozofit is fairly new to me but I love the concept! Basically if you have an iPhone, you can “scan” your body and this app will take measurements for you. It saves your previous scans so you can compare your body side-by-side. Kind of like having side-by-side pictures of yourself, but it’s just a grey figure on a grid, making it more unbiased! I love this for tracking non-scale progress.

Cronometer- Cronometer is a great tool for tracking your food/water intake, weight/biometrics, fasting time, supplements, and exercise. You can tailor your calorie/macros to your goals. Your daily calorie burn is automatically input if you have a tracker such as an Apple watch. If you get premium, you have access to personalized suggestions to help you hit your goals! My favorite feature is the bar code scanner, so if you have any food item with a bar code, it will pull it up automatically, making it super easy to track your food.

Conclusion:

My hope and prayer for this blog is to educate and empower you to help you build up your confidence on your health and fitness journey! There is so much information out there and I pray this summary helps clear up some of the hottest topics in women’s weight loss for you! If you have any questions or would like a follow-up blog post clarifying certain details, let me know in the comments!

Hopefully I’ll see you soon, God bless you, and take care.

Love,

Abby

My Testimony

Coming from a morbidly obese family that loves food, I found myself sick and tired in my very early twenties… Symptoms ranged from mental fog to debilitating anxiety and cramps. My face was swollen, I had migraines, my joints ached, I was overweight and always tired. Everything I ate seemed to upset my stomach. I tried to lose weight numerous times. I remember spending hours in the cardio theater of my gym, going on runs, and trying to keep up with the trainers on Insanity and P90X. I tried Slim Fast, the South Beach diet, Adkins, Special K, Advocare, and the like, to no avail. I even went so far as to have my thyroid checked and be tested for Celiac Disease! Then I grew hungry for change. I knew I had to break the cycle of obesity and chronic illness. It couldn’t all be genetic- could it? What is the best diet anyway?

Eager to find answers, I thought no better way than to become a professional on the topic of nutrition. I started my humble beginnings enrolled at Columbus State Community College and eventually graduated from The Ohio State University.

Throughout my education, I implemented what I was taught into my own life. The standard of care in The United States- following the USDA guidelines: 6 meals throughout the day for “steady blood sugars,” low fat, minimum of 130g of carbohydrates per day for “brain function,” whole grains, fruits and veggies, lean meats, and replacing saturated fat with seed oils such as exchanging butter for the “healthier” margarine, etc... But what I learned along the way was shocking. It didn’t work. Not only did it not work, it made things worse. And it didn’t make any sense when it came to nutrition therapy. The nutrition interventions we were told to give seemed eerily similar to what exacerbated a disease or caused a disease in the first place! For example: Why were we recommending ice cream and snack cakes to patients with cancer when we know that cancer cells thrive off of sugar?! Something wasn’t right and I knew I would learn why…

Now in the early years of my nutrition education, my own mother embarked on a ketogenic diet change in order to lose some weight after having 7 kids. I was alarmed at the time because it was a “fad diet” and “dangerous” according to what we were being taught in school. It would even lead to heart disease, according to one of my professors. I didn’t want my mom to have a heart attack, so I confronted her with my concerns. I handed my mom one of my introductory textbooks: “Nutrition: concepts and controversies,” and asked her to reconsider what she was doing. She then handed me a book: “Fat for Fuel” by Dr Joseph Mercola, and asked me to read it and reconsider what I was being taught in school. Everything in that book made sense. I could see where our nation started and where it was going. I understood where our nation had gone wrong, sometimes out of desperation in times of famine, industrializing the way we eat, realizing the evils of big companies taking advantage of us to make a profit, creating a long-term problem for our country. Still skeptical and probably biased, because “how could our educational system and our own government be lying to us?”

I started doing my own research and asking more questions, leading to more books and more research and more questions, and so on and so forth, all arriving to the same conclusion: this is the answer. Not surprisingly, throughout my nutrition education, the more in depth I learned about the body and its metabolism, the more a ketogenic way of eating made sense- especially as a form of nutrition therapy for various chronic diseases. After implementing a ketogenic way of eating into my own lifestyle just to lose weight, I found myself cured from all the aches and pains I hadn’t even considered to be diet-related! My mental focus was never better. My sleep improved. My skin was clear. My joints were no longer in pain. My digestive issues were gone. Even my period symptoms were practically non-existent!

Fast forward to about five years later, present day. I have been working in long-term-care facilities for the past 4 years. I see what happens on a daily basis, what can happen if you don’t take care of your health. If you don’t steward your body well… It’s heart breaking. One stroke and you could have half of your body paralyzed and need someone to help you with all of your toileting, bathing, dressing, even eating. You could have your toes, feet, or even legs amputated due to poor blood sugars. Depression so debilitating you wind up with bed sores. You could lose the ability to speak or even recognize loved ones due to dementia (now being referred to by some as type 3 diabetes)… While some cases may have been inevitable, I have found that most cases have been preventable. In other words, it didn’t have to be this way.

This isn’t to scare or shame anyone… This is simply the wake-up call that one may need to fully embrace the blessing that is life and to live it well, firstly, by stewarding their body well. Exercising because we can. We have legs that work and/or a heart that works. Eating healthy because we want to maintain our independence for as long as possible. We want to recognize our loved one’s faces… What is your “why?”

Now more than ever, I feel a sense of urgency to tell everyone what I know. That is precisely why I created this space. To help inform others they don’t have to settle with being sick and tired as their new norm. They can be healed! Food is medicine! Here in this space, you will find testimonies, resources, tools, and community in order to take your first steps to better your health so you can live the life God has called you to fulfill.

While I specialize in nutrition, I know from experience diet and exercise are only part of the battle when it comes to optimizing your health. In order to do that, we need to also invite God into our journey. I owe all glory to God and His plan- which is why I firmly believe in keeping Christ Jesus at the center of it all.

Let us live by the Spirit and bear good fruit! 🍎

What does The Fruit of The Spirit Have to do with Nutrition?

If you’re not familiar with the fruit of the Spirit, you may want to reference Galatians 5:22, as the Apostle Paul writes to the churches of Galatia. The fruit of the Spirit and Nutrition are deeply connected because both involve cultivating a life that honors God through intentional choices. Here’s how each fruit relates to nutrition and health:

Love- Caring for your body through good nutrition is an act of love toward God, yourself, and others. When you nourish your body well, you have the energy to serve those around you.

Joy- A well-nourished body and balanced blood sugar contribute to emotional stability and joy. Eating in a way that optimizes your metabolism and hormones can help prevent mood swings and fatigue.

Peace- Proper nutrition can reduce anxiety and stress, promoting peace within your body. Avoiding inflammatory foods and focusing on whole, God-given foods helps create internal harmony.

Patience- Achieving health goals takes time and consistency. Patience is key in the journey to reversing disease, losing weight, or improving fertility.

Kindness- Choosing nutritious foods is a form of kindness to yourself. Also, sharing healthy meals with others can be a way to extend kindness to those around you.

Goodness- Eating whole, unprocessed foods honors the goodness of God’s creation and His design for our bodies.

Faithfulness- Sticking to a nutrition plan that supports your health requires faithfulness. This includes meal prepping, resisting unhealthy temptations, and trusting that God’s way (not fad diets) is best.

Gentleness- Being gentle with yourself on your health journey is important. Avoid harsh self-criticism and embrace grace when making progress.

Self-Control- One of the biggest challenges in nutrition is self-control, especially in a world filled with ultra-processed foods. The Holy Spirit empowers us to make wise choices that support health and well-being.

By aligning your nutrition with the fruit of the Spirit, you are not just eating for physical health but also for spiritual growth, using food as a tool to glorify God in your body.

What would you add? Comment below to join the conversation and share with a family member, friend, or small group you think could benefit from this!

God bless you!