Your Trainer Paige

What works AGAINST you:

-skipping breakfast
-dry salad for lunch
-excessive cardio
-not prioritizing protein
-eliminating food groups
-skimping on sleep
-making your deficit too large
-not eating carbs
-not lifting weights
-sedentary daily step count (>5-6k steps/day)

Ask yourself this: have extremes ever worked for you in the past? Like, TRULY worked for you?

Instead, it’s when we start doing smart strength training with adequate physical activity, combined with a deficit you can hit consistently - and nutrition habits that help with adherence and maintaining lean muscle tissue ✨

*Fall Strong, my new 6-week fat loss program starts 9/16 w/ prep week starting 9/9. Get on the waitlist for first access + $$ off by commenting FALL below - you can also find the🔗 in prof :)

—

Set your environment up for success to make it easier to be consistent ✨

Yes, thinking of Future You takes some time and planning. But it also eliminate impulsive thinking, decision fatigue, and the feeling you get when you neglect doing what’s required to make progress toward your goals.

Studies show your environment can either be helpful or hurtful in terms of whether you’re consistent. Why not make fat loss easier and set up some environmental cues for yourself?

Which of these do you do? What would you add to this list??

Save this post for 7 ridiculously easy meals you *will* actually make ☝🏻

I love new recipes. I love finding them, saving them, sharing them…

…and then leaving them to the dust in my browser history 😂

With two littles who are growing our lives are getting busier in the evenings.
I like having ingredients on hand that won’t be left to die in the crisper 🥬 that I can pull out at a moments notice and have a meal on the table in minutes 🤌🏼

I also like making one of those recipes every blue moon. Sometimes it even means a meal gets added to our normal rotation :)

What are some of your ‘plan B’ meals??

Save this for this weekend! 😅

It really comes down to needing to do the same things you do on the weekend that you do during the work week.

Otherwise, it’ll look something like this:

Maintenance intake = 2,100kcals
Target deficit 1,700kcals

Mon = 1,700
Tues = 1,700
Wed= 1,700
Thurs = 2,100
Fri = 2,500
Sat = 2,600
Sun = 2,200

Weekly average = 2,071, which puts you right back at maintenance.

My best advice is to try to follow the same eating schedule with the same meals that you eat during the week.

Yes, you might go out with friends or a significant other for a meal out.

But ask yourself: is this *truly* a special occasion for YOU.

If not, aim to choose foods that align with your plan.

And let me tell you: bites here and there really do add up when you’re out to eat because they often go unaccounted for, or less accounted than they actually are.

One more tip that’s worth mentioning:

Don’t throw out the baby with the bathwater.

If you go out for drinks with co-workers on Friday night and know you blew your deficit for sure, you can get right back on track with your next meal choice the following morning.

One surplus day rarely puts you back at maintenance. But letting that one day turn into two or three does (or in a slight surplus.)

☝🏻Save this for your next cut! If one of these common consistency blockers gets ya every time, there are loopholes + solutions.

You’re going along, chasing your goals when 3 weeks in, you either stop making progress or want to throw in the towel.

It’s frustrating, annoying, and well, a bit of a waste of time and energy.

From my experience, it’s usually due to one of these three progress blockers.

Yes, there are more, of course.

But I find having a list of options to choose from to navigate really any problem or roadblock can be helpful. I’m all about having a path moving forward and learning from my prior missteps.

What would you add to this list?

Obviously I’m the same person in all three pictures. My personality is my personality, and thankfully, my body image is pretty dang solid in all three pictures.

But my identity has evolved over the years.

But my habits have changed over the years.

When you want to become the person who XYZ, your choices need to be aligned with what that person does.

This likely means giving yourself a little more credit, and realizing you hold more power and control over your choices than you might be admitting to yourself.

Are you ready to empower yourself to make those habit changes and become a different version of yourself?

This might look like….

-giving up your nightly wine

-tracking food for a while

-going to BED earlier

-waking up earlier

-going out less…or making different choices when you do go out

-stopping the mindless snacking

-stopping the nighttime snacking

-planning or prepping ahead of time

to name a few.

Spring Sculpt is open for enrollment. If you want to make some positive changes and start seeing sustainable results, I’m ready when you are 💫

I’ve transformed my own body and have helped my clients transform theirs, and know what I’ve seen work, time and time again. I’ll be implementing every single one of these frameworks in this program.

🔗 in bio, or comment Spring for more info.

As we get further into spring + spring goals, I thought it might be helpful to share some things my most successfulclients in my most recent fat loss program had in common:

Main Takeaways:

✅Make the decision once to be all in (make sure “all in” is a DOABLE all in!)

✅Decide to be ruthlessly consistent

✅Work WITH your limitations

✅Get RIGHT back on track after a setback

✅Plan ahead for success as much as you can

So many people slash their cals too low, or take on too many changes all at once. This leads to inconsistency, which decreases the belief you can do it, which leads to burn out.

Instead:

➡️Figure out your deficit sweet spot

➡️Make your meal structure one that makes you feel as good as you can in said deficit

➡️Figure how many days you can realistically train

➡️And realistically raise your daily step count

➡️Do it every single day. Which you can, because now it’s a sustainable plan

🙌🏼See long-term, maintainable results

Registration for my 5-week Program Spring Sculpt opens 4/1! 🥳

If you’re ready to to make smart training and nutritional changes for YOU that will help you look and feel your best this summer, see the link in my profile, or comment Spring and I’ll DM you the link for the wait list (that’s already filling up!)

Mini Cut Results 🥁

Recapping lbs lost, inches, and pictures (in stories today and in mini cut highlight)

My consistency of my deficit, protein, nutrition habits, and workouts, and overall thoughts.

I think a big takeaway is that it matters far more what you do the majority of the year then what you do in five weeks.

You can get some good results in five weeks, sure.

but then you need to keep going. Whether that’s with recomp/maintenance, strength, a maintenance break followed by another fat loss phase, an extended FL phase, etc. It’s important to periodize your goals with your year and your seasons.

See you on stories! Thanks for joining along 💕

P

H

I think it’s also important to point out that your maintenance calories is more of a range than a set exact number.

Our NEAT, our training, how much we eat, our sleep, among other factors all impact our total daily energy expenditure.

And some people more than other up regulate or down regulate both NEAT and the thermic effect of food depending on if they’re in a surplus or deficit. If you’ve heard of “set point theory,” our bodies prefer homeostasis, and some bodies more than others.

That’s why it’s a good idea - at least to some degree - to keep tabs on step count, and to try and keep this reasonably, and for the most part, the same from day to day.

I hope this info is helpful! XO
Paige

Look this post is mostly in fun, and I’ve got nothing but love for you 💙

But it also holds truth — these are some of the most common “mistakes” that are so so easily overlooked when it comes to consistency.

Remember that it takes most being at least 80% consistent….but 80% consistent looks a LOT more consistent than most people think.

When you do the math, that means missing only about 4-5 days a MONTH🤯

And the things listed in the post can be “missed,” making you FEEL like you’re being consistent, when you’re actually not.

Snacking while making dinner, on the couch, taking extra handfuls of food, eating off of your kids plates…that stuff adds up FAST.

Multiple meals out per week, while enjoyable, can send someone from being in a deficit straight to maintenance or even a slight surplus.

Alcohol calories can add up, impacts food choices, and negatively affects recovery.

Not measuring high cal foods like dips, condiments, PB, can be a + of hundreds of cals.

Not everyone has to track their food to see results, but it does accounting for it in some way.

I hope this is helpful,
Paige

How to recover from your workouts faster? How to combat soreness?

First, it’s probably not stretching*

But there are things you can prioritize that will help aid in muscle recovery.

And it’s worth mentioning👉🏼

❌Muscle isn’t built in the gym

It’s broken down in the gym

And built in the other 23 hours - especially those of which you’re sleeping (spoiler alert!)

Some ways to prioritize recovery:

1. Sleep - enough of it - 7-9 hours - and good quality

2. Walking - preferably outside to improve circulation and recovery (and mood and NEAT!)

3. Try taking 2 rest days in a row

4. Hydrate

5. Ensure nutrition is on point (eating enough, and quality nutrition)

6. Stress management (either reducing stressors or managing stress)

7. Ensure training volume (either total or sets to failure) isn’t too high

I hope this is helpful! XO
Paige

Week 1 Recap + week 2 planned meals

So far so good! I am tracking during these four weeks, b/c slightly more of you preferred to see consistent tracking for this cut vs. making habit-based changes only.

But to be honest, I 100% think I could have just cut out nighttime snacking and be very successful these four weeks. That’s basically where my deficit is coming from 😂

A few things I’m doing to stack the deck in my favor:

-Sticking with 1-2 breakfasts and lunches each week
-Drawing a bight line/setting a ground rule that I don’t nighttime snack - period 🤷🏼‍♀️
-ensuring I hit my step count
-the usual criteria I have for my clients, like a sustainable deficit, meal structure that supports hunger + energy levels, consistent training, etc.

Thanks for joining me these four weeks!
Paige

The W’s of it 😇

Also:

✅I’m happy with my current bod
✅I’m excited to see what can happen in the next 4 weeks
✅I carry most of my weight in my lower bod
✅This will be similar-ish to the 5-week Spring Sculpt plan I have starting in April

Stress in and of itself does not cause weight gain or bellyfat.

A calorie surplus in and of itself, causes weight gain.

Stress can, however, really stack the deck against your chances of consistently adhering to a calorie deficit and recovering adequately from your workouts.

👎🏼Emotional stress makes it us more susceptible to giving into cravings of dopamine-inducing, hyper palatable foods.

👎🏼It also makes us more prone to make fast, easy food choices like fast food, rather than cooking healthy meals.

👎🏼Really, it just all around makes it harder to do the things necessary to stick to a calorie deficit…consistently.

👎🏼It also interferes with our ability to recover (and reap the benefits) from our training sessions.

👎🏼To really pour salt in the wound, it makes it harder to get quality sleep, which interferes not only with recovery more, but also our ability to appropriately manage our hunger signals.

👉🏼Moral of the story: If you want to see body composition changes (and be healthier overall:)

✅Manage your stressors, and/or
✅Reduce your stressors

And if you truly can’t do either of these things, seriously reconsider whether or not it’s actually a good time to be thinking about fatloss.

I hope this is helpful,
-P

If you’re feeling attacked or triggered, know I’ve got nothing but LOVE for you - and I made this post with love (and some humor)

And— truthfully, these are some of the most common nutrition “misses” I see when we feel like we’re being consistent.

And since we’re being candid, my kryptonite was slide 5 until recently. I simply (but not easily) cut it out, but mainly b/c of how very clearly it negatively affected the quality of my sleep (deep sleep and resting HR)

Which of these slides do you struggle with??

Message delivered with love (always,)💝

Paige

If you want your cut to be as quick and painless as possible, make sure to avoid doing these 5 things:

1. Skipping breakfast and eating like a bird all day
2. Constantly being in a dietmindset without being in an actual deficit
3. Having *too much* flexibility - on weekends, meals out, alcohol, etc.
4. Never taking responsibility/accountability for your choices (pls ditch the victim mindset. this is your life and your choice)
5. Logging your food retroactively (this one should prob be higher in order of importance!)

Read the slides for more nuance and context :)

Would 5 ways to make a deficit suck LESS be helpful?

I hope this helps💕,

-P

Allow me to clarify ☺️

there are no exercises that will hurry up fat loss,

*but* when writing a program for someone with a FL goal, exercise selection — and sequencing — both play a major part.

I’m not going to choose the exact same exercises for someone with a hypertrophy goal that I will for someone with a fat loss goal.

The exercises, the sequencing, the supersetting, the RIR, rest, etc will be very different.

So while there aren’t any “best exercises” for FL, there are exercises I’d choose over others for the sake of:

✔️expenditure
✔️allowing someone to exert a good amount of effort,
✔️still being able to recover from that workout,
✔️maintaining lean muscle tissue

I hope this is helpful!
Paige

Another big one that could resonate for you is to recognize that this is time-bound.

You’re not going to be in a deficit for months and months on end.

You do the work for a while (*consistently*), develop the habits, get the progress, and then go into intentional maintenance for a while (what # of weeks of months ‘while’ = will differ from person to person.)

You still have to do the things during that maintenance part, but it’s much more flexible.

We all know the definition of insanity by now.

Meet yourself where you are.

Any goal in any area of life will require sacrifice and a dose of self-discipline. I know we don’t like that, but it’s true.

But don’t bite off more than you can chew.

Much love,

P

Caveat:

Don’t just go in and add these techniques all w***y nilly.

Choose one for a good while (weeksss) and stick with it.

And use it just for the exercise you’re wanting to progress with….maybe one more.

Also, I use these protocols in my clients’programming all the time, and it’s usually not solely so they can increase the load on an exercise.

Usually it’s because we’re trying to get more failure/fatigue, stimulus, output, and/or intensity out of the workout without costing them something else (mechanical damage, a ton of extra time added to their sessions, etc.)

Have you tried any of these techniques?

I’m here if you have questions!

-P

5 Things They ARE Doing to See ‘Em:

1. Enough strength training to maintain or build lean muscle tissue 👉🏼 and supplementing with steps OR cardio depending on preference or need

2. Ensuring they’re in a deficit by tracking an intake and protein in ranges — or by making dial-moving nutritional changes/swaps 🤝

3. Having a plan of seamless meals they can easily put together throughout the week that fit their goals ✅

4. Enjoying what - or a *version* of what - they’re making their family for dinner

5. Implementing a meal structure that helps keep them fuller and more satisfied throughout the day 🙌🏼

I hope this is helpful ❤️
-P

Stop obsessing over the outcome and how far you have to go.

Start being *more* focused on the daily Ws.

☑️Hitting your nutrition
☑️Getting in your strength training
☑️Getting in your steps or cardio
☑️Sleeping 7-8 hours

These are *daily* wins you could be celebrating every single day you check them all off.

So if you have a tendency of getting overwhelmed or discouraged, stop focusing on the end goal and start focusing on what you can control ✅

Bonus: these daily wins are what you actually need to nail to get to your end goal.

Sounds simple, but a good ol’ mindset shift is the missing piece for some to see success in their goals.

I hope this helps.

-P

I’ve transformed my own body and have helped my clients transform theirs, and here’s what I’ve seen work, time and time again:

✅a consistent calorie deficit will get you leaner, but making that deficit manageable enough for you to be consistent is key

✅focusing on protein is key for feeling fuller and to maintain (or build) lean muscle tissue

✅smart, periodized strength training is required to get the toned and defined look you’re after

But fr. There are plenty of good coaches and sustainable ways to see lasting progress out there.

DETOX crap is not one of them.

I don’t care what your neighbor Sally told you about her experience.

Hang up the call.

Close the browser tab.

And remember that you can do hard things, including being consistent with movement and nutrition this whole damn year.

If you’re reading this, I care about you. I don’t want you wasting your money, time, or precious energy on a scam.

Also if you’re reading this and DO want sustainable fatloss in the new year….let’s do this together. Find the link that’s in my rhymes-with-Ohio

That’s all.

much love,
-P

Thanks for the memories, lessons, and growth, 2023!

Happy New Year, my friends! Let’s go into 2024 with a crush it mindset, shall we?

But I don’t mean crushing it by taking on ALL the things b/c motivation is sky high and then turn around and *be* crushed by all those said things.

No.

I have a couple big goals for 2024, but I am always cognizant not to bite off more than I can chew.

And this year is no exception.

The new year can bring a slew of excitement. And I love the feeling of that 🤩

but I think it’s important not to let the feeling of “bleh” from the holidays being over + the excitement of New Year’s goals lead to drastic, lofty goals that will very likely fizzle out come February 1 👎🏼

Let’s use this excitement to be the impetus for making positive changes, but please don’t forget this important piece of the puzzle:

many of us think it goes like this:

Motivation > action/changes > results

but in reality, at least after that first “I’m-starting-a-new-program-motivation”……it goes like this:

Action/changes —> results —> motivation

We have to do the things even when motivation or excitement might be low.

Then come the results.

And with seeing progress, comes more motivation to keep going.

So in order to make delayed gratification > instant gratification, we need to make sure the positive changes we’re making:

a) are actually ones we can do….consistently, and
b) will garner some type of results.

I PROMISE you that you don’t need a detox, the perfect secret super duper omg customized macronutrient ratio, IF, or any other more rigid approach.

Cheers to 2024 🥂

-P

Studies (and actual people in IRL) show you can build muscle into your 80s.

If you can:

-slow the aging process
-decrease your mortality rate
-build muscle
-increase your metabolism
-improve your bone density as you age

…what are you waiting for?!

***
The wait list is filling up for New Year Sculpted Strong, my 9-week Fat Loss Periodization Program ——> and will include optimized strength training (and nutrition) for fatloss. Get on it to get first chance at enrollment (and $25off!)

🔗 in prof.

As we get closer to 2024, I thought it might be helpful to share some things my most successfulclients in ’23 have in common.

Main takeaways:

✅work with what you’ve got to deal with (your current situation)

✅manage either your expectations or the work you’ll realistically be able to put in

✅BE. CON-SIS-TENT with your daily actions to get you there

Merry Christmas to you! 🎄

We celebrate the morning with a big brunch with friends… And have spent every other waking moment either opening a toy or putting one together 🤪

I love our annual Christmas morning picture by the tree because it’s an accurate depiction of reality:

🎄bleary-eyed mom and dad from staying up too late the night before
🎄no one matching because they still had Christmas jammies that fit from last year (swipe to see last year‘s picture when we all had matching ones)
🎄at least one of the kids is blurry because they don’t stop moving after a sugar-filled brunch
🎄a complete mess of a kitchen behind the person taking the picture

It’s just a beautiful mess, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

swipe to see the silly picture, and then the last four years pictures 🤭

Love to you all! Merry Christmas!

Bottom line:

Enjoy the foods you love, the people you love, and don’t stress about cals or macros on Christmas Day.

Practice mindfulness with eating (and the rest of the day.) Then just get back to your normal meals the next day!

Merry Christmas 🎄
-P

Yup, you can loseweight without lifting weights. But you’ll never see me recommend it.

The reason is simple:

fatloss >>>> weightless

Unless you’re OK with:

❌losing muscle
❌making it far more difficult to maintain said weightloss, and
❌not adding any shape or definition to your body
❌not to mention the HEALTH benefits of gaining or maintaining muscle tissue (which are vast *and* important-esppppecially if you’re a woman entering middle age)

And if not, you need to be strength training if you’re in a deficit.

period, end of story.

Even just twice a week. Meet yourself where you are ❤️

****
if you want optimized strength training for fat loss (not just *weight* loss 😇) enrollment for New Year Sculpted Strong, my 9-week Fat Loss Periodization Program opens on 1/1. Make sure you’re on the list to get early access for $$ off (!!)

Link in you-know-where 🔗