Monica's Success Story
For this week's success story I want to introduce you to my client Monica. She and I have been working together for the past year, and during that time she has lost 13 pounds. But even more impressive are some of the non-scale victories that she's achieved!
Monica deals with severe inflammation of the joints including gout, with pain levels that require her to use a wheelchair sometimes. During the past year we've been working together on several areas of lifestyle changes designed to help her improve her quality of life.
Monica started with simple (but not always easy) things like drinking more water to support the body's natural detox and pain relief processes, and sleep hygiene to help her feel more rested and energized, as well as prevent eating out of exhaustion, to stay awake, or for comfort during times of pain. We also worked together on mental habits such as learning to stop short of overdoing it, to preserve energy for tomorrow or next week. Monica realized that setting aside her pride and using her wheelchair was sometimes the smart choice so she wouldn't pay later for overexerting herself and depleting her energy stores.
We also worked a lot on habits that help ease or manage chronic pain: regular movement, yoga, breathing exercises, stretching, an anti-inflammatory diet. Pain can be so debilitating, physically and emotionally, that sometimes it's just easier NOT to do what we know is good for us. I've been most impressed with Monica's positive attitude and willingness to "just do it"—undoubtedly the hardest part of habit change.
When we try to modify our diet and exercise routines, change can sometimes come at a pace so slow as to be discouraging, but Monica has stuck with it, and with perseverance and determination she is eating less processed food and more protein and veggies, and reducing the amount of carbs in her diet little by little. She has committed to doing something toward her physical health each week. Most important is the can-do attitude she brings to these changes, starting over as many times as it takes when work travel interrupts the best-laid plans. She even made a personalized tracker sheet to customize the 2B Mindset tracker for her own goals. I always say that the #1 predictor of success is simply being unwilling to give up. Part of this is sometimes modifying goals instead of just saying "that won't work for me." That's exactly what Monica did here and I think that speaks volumes!
She has been working with a basic strength training routine I created to help her regulate appetite and metabolism, as well as decrease the likelihood of injury. She also practices yoga and swims when her body allows—and she spends as much time as she can in a kayak during the Wisconsin summer!
Since regularly practicing her strength routine, Monica noticed she has gotten stronger and uses better form in her paddling. Recently she was able to not only paddle herself back to shore when a storm rolled in, but also tow a fellow kayaker who had gotten tired - simply incredible!!
Monica, I am so proud of your progress from the past year and I can't wait to see what you accomplish in the next!
