The Overcomplicated World of Nutrition for Weight Loss

Being 16 and having my whole self worth tied up into the ‘look’ and weight of my body. I would spend years eating foods I thought were healthy, following certain diets and feeling like crap if I didn’t look a certain way.

I noticed amazing changes, I learned how to truly eat intuitively, without craving sugary foods and without guilt around certain foods.

My Journey

It would take me another 10 years before I finally realized just how much I linked my self-worth to my body image.

I don’t know about you, but when I was growing up the only consistent thing I ever saw around food for weight loss was the word ‘diet’. This was then followed by a set of rules around which foods to eat or not eat.

These diets changed all the time, but they were all promoted as a way not just to lose weight, but to be a certain size, or a certain body shape. The words ‘bikini body’ were constantly floated around alongside pictures on magazine covers.

For well over 20 years I’ve been exposed to every diet under the sun, all claiming the same thing and all perpetuating the overcomplication and unhealthy habits around nutrition.

At 26 years old I started putting on weight within a matter of months. I tried all my usual “tricks” of salads, cutting carbs, and inputting every item of food painstakingly into an app, but none of that worked anymore. My body, my digestion, and my gut health were shot and I had no solid information or understanding of nutrition and food to know what to do.

The problem with diets

They don’t actually give us an understanding of nutrition at the most basic and fundamental level. Instead they throw around words like macros, calorie counting, high protein, low carb without explaining why we should be following any of those rules.

Change your views

When I finally lost weight, started feeling good in my own skin, stopped thinking about the scale, stopped binge eating, and started truly nourishing my body it was because I learned about what our bodies need and how to make the best decisions to fuel my body. I stopped perpetuating the overcomplication of nutrition and stopped creating unhealthy habits towards food.

If it had “worked”, meaning if those old habits did work to lose weight, then I wouldn’t be in the position of struggling to lose weight time and time again, because I would have created long-lasting results.

It's a personal journey

I spent four years trying to lose that weight. I was depressed, I felt horrible in my body, I was constantly bloated and struggled to find anything I felt comfortable in.

For some, my weight gain might not seem like it was a lot, but it’s relative to each and every person. What brings someone to their lowest they have ever felt is not something that can be judged by anyone else. I was lost and couldn’t figure out what to do to feel better.

So, what changed in order for me to finally lose weight? The way I viewed my body, my weight loss goals, and learning about nutrition properly.

First, I started to fully appreciate everything my body could do, and then I started to really look at how I treated my body (meaning the stress I put it through via food, lifestyle and fitness) which was a huge aspect of what was getting in the way of losing weight.

Second, I started to focus on how I wanted to feel in my body, not just what I wanted to look like. I stopped worrying about a set amount of kgs to lose, or what the scales said. I started to look more closely at the foods I was eating, and the stress that was messing with my gut health, digestion and the exercise I was doing. I stopped doing exercise simply to look a certain way and instead found workouts I loved.

With those big changes and shifts, I set about throwing diet rules out the window, and focused on eating quality foods, wholefoods and foods without additives that severely mess with our hormones and weight. I noticed amazing changes, I learned how to truly eat intuitively, without craving sugary foods and without guilt around certain foods.

I lost weight sustainably, over a year, and continued to find more ways to look after my body. Then I started learning and studying the fundamentals of nutrition, and found that everything I did was exactly what true Science and health studies around the world have shown. There is no one diet that does it all.

I was able to heal my body image, my unhealthy relationship with food and my misunderstanding of food. Unfortunately, there is still so much misinformation out there that young girls and women will see as truth and that is such a huge part of why I do what I do.

It’s why I work with women to heal their relationship with food, to provide simple yet essential nutrition information that allows them to lose weight in a healthy way, to fit into their clothes more comfortably, to feel confident in their body and their food choices.

I hope to continue to help many more women who stand where I stood, who are sick of it all, who are feeling lost and want to simply feel amazing within their body again.