097: Results Without Perfectionism with Kasey Kruer

Introduction 

You're listening to Biceps after Babies radio episode number 97.

Hello and welcome to Biceps after Babies radio. A podcast for ladies who know that fitness is about so much more than pounds lost or PRs. It's about feeling confident in your skin and empowered in your life. I'm your host, Amber Brueseke, a registered nurse, personal trainer, online fitness coach, wife, and mom of four. My guests and I will excite and motivate you to take action in your own personal fitness as we talk about nutrition, exercise mindset, personal development, and executing life with conscious intention. If your goal is to look, feel, and be strong and experience transformation from the inside out, you, my friend are in the right place. Thank you for tuning in, now let’s jump into today’s episode.

Amber B  0:47 

Hey, Hey, Hey, welcome back to another episode of biceps after babies radio. I'm your host Amber Brueseke and today I have a fabulous interview with a Macros 101 client. So Kasey Kruer has done her last round of Macros 101, and at the end of each of the Macros 101 rounds, we do a transformation contest and all the members inside the community vote on the biggest transformation. And this is not about losing the most weight. It isn't about having the best progress pictures. That's not how the decision is made. The people record a video and they tell their story. And the members of the community who have been, you know, everybody's been watching everyone's transformations, vote and pick who is the biggest transformation. And Kasey was the winner of the transformation contest for our April group. And she has such an amazing story that I wanted to make sure we brought her on so that she could share because she hits on a couple of different things that I see in a lot of women and how she was able to overcome them is really, really inspiring. And so we will introduce, Kasey will introduce herself until kind of talk a little bit about our story but a couple of things that I want to highlight. One, Kasey is a mom, she's a mom of three. And I'm sure a lot of you can relate to that. But even more than just a mom or I shouldn't say more. In addition to being a mom, she has also worked full time.

Amber B  2:12

And we kind of talk a little bit about this at the very end of the episode. And I wanted to bring this up because I had someone point out and I appreciated the feedback that I received from you guys. I can't remember if this was an email or if it was a review on iTunes. But just making the comment that it would be nice to hear from more women who work full time because I don't have to tell you there are differences, right? There are differences in what you experienced, being a mom or not being a mom or working full time, or not working full time. And so I'm really excited that Kasey has that experience that she can bring in as a mom, as somebody who works full time and as someone who has gone through an illness that she really had to battle and left her really feeling a little bit like her body is broken and this is a sentiment that I hear a lot of women echo of feeling like my body's broken It's, for some reason things work for other people, and they don't work for me.

Amber B  3:04 

And Kasey shares how she went through trying a lot of things and failing at a lot of diets and trying to be able to get that way to get the weight off. And how she was able to continue to put herself out there again and say, you know, even though I've tried all these things, and I failed, and I feel like my body is broken, taking that leap and that plunge in April to sign up for Macros 101 and to come to join us and to go through that coaching process which Kasey will speak to both her physical transformations and I'm really excited for you to hear physical transformations because it may not be what you think, and also her mental transformations and there is a part in this interview where Kasey shares something that's very near and dear to her. And for those of you who are moms may find it kind of touches accord with you as well because she shares something about her children and about her experience with macro counting that has strengthened that relationship with that her kids and I love that Kasey was willing to come on and share her story, share her experience, share her results, and share how being perfect isn't the goal and honestly isn't required for results that you want to see. So without further ado, let's jump into that episode with Kasey Kruer.

Amber B  4:28

All right, I would love to welcome Kasey Kruer to the podcast. Kasey, how are you doing?

Kasey  4:33  

I'm doing great, Amber. Thanks.

Amber B  4:35

Yeah, I am really excited. We've been talking a little bit before we hit record, and I'm excited about some of the things that you're going to share. Because I think a lot of women are going to be able to relate to the experience that you had. And then being able to see your success is going to make them feel like it's possible for them. So let's start out with just a little bit of an introduction. Tell us a little bit about yourself. what you like to do and what your fitness journey has kind of looked up, like up to this point?

Kasey  5:03

Okay, so that's kind of a loaded question. I'm a mom to three little guys 12, 9, and 6. I work full time as a psychologist and I am 45 years old. And I guess my fitness journey through life has always been, I've always been very active. I've always been my husband and  I both want to work out. We've always lifted. I grew up in California, so I played soccer from the time I could walk and so I went to college on a soccer scholarship. So I've always classified myself as what I would call an athlete. And then, in 2018 I got pretty sick. And that sort of disrupted my fitness journey and my weight journey to be totally honest. For a while, I lost almost 40 pounds. Most of that was muscle. With the illness that I had, I was basically able to eat seven foods. And I was probably consuming 400 to 700 calories a day. So that lasted for about a year. And I'm actually still working on some of that. But after I was able to incorporate more foods, I immediately just started eating a lot. And so going from 400 to 700 calories a day to 2000 or 2500. I packed on 35 pounds of what I would say good solid fat.

Amber B  6:36 

Yeah,

Kasey  6:37

no, it's not

Amber B  6:37

of not muscle,

Kasey  6:39

right? Yeah. No, it's not, it was not a good experience for me. Let's just say that.

Amber B  6:43 

Yeah, yeah. So um, so back in in 2018, you had this illness you went through this period of time having to be really restricted with your food and I think it's really important to point out that that restriction was coming from a medical place. And I've and you're not the only person that I've ever heard of this, right. Like people have different experiences in terms of food intake and food restrictions. And so you've come in from this place of not being able to feel your body, really trying to figure out the medical side of this. And getting to the point where believing more food and then seeing that weight come back may be that you had lost, but instead, you lost muscle and you replaced it.

Kasey  7:22

Yeah, that's an important point too Amber. I think because I wasn't sick for that entire year I worked out not at all I mean, I had no energy. I was in bed every day at four o'clock. I mean, even my husband remarks to me at one point during this illness, like, look how thin your legs are like he usually calls me sumo wrestler because I have pretty big muscular legs. And I had gone to like, stick skinny legs, and I think that was shocking for him. And for me, too. So when I gave that feedback, I lost so much muscle that a lot of it did come back as to let's just say not muscle.

Amber B  7:55 

Right, right. Yeah. And then that puts us around what time period are we talking about?

Kasey  8:01

So I was pretty sick from about December 2018 to probably Christmas time of last year so December 2019.

Amber B  8:08

Okay, and then take us to that moment where you're sitting there, you've gained a lot of weight back, you're not feeling your best, you're struggling probably with the thoughts that come with putting on that weight so fast after this illness, and where were you at mentally and physically at that point?

Kasey  8:26  

Um, mentally I was in the trash can. And it was physically I, it was like this such a dichotomy because physically I felt so much better like so much more of my energy had come back. But when I went to put on my clothes, nothing fit. Everything was tight. Like I just felt like the Stay Puft Marshmallow mom inside his body that was not supposed to be mine. And so like I said, but physically I was grappling with, I feel good because of my energy levels. And like, I know my body is you know, beating this illness but why physically do I look so awful and mess on the mentally that was really messing with me. Like, I don't understand how I can feel so good but look at that.

Amber B  9:09

Yeah, yeah. Awesome. And so then what did you try? Like initially when what was, talked us through like the point where you're like okay, this is enough we're gonna do something about this and then what were some of those first steps?

Kasey  9:21

Oh my gosh, so back in December when like all this weight and really I call it crept on but I really feel like it just slammed onto me like a month like here I was with all this extra weight and so New Year's rolls around I'm like, okay, cool, you know it's time to get this weight off Kasey. So I started on I bought a couple of different shred programs and that's in a different forum but I really felt like Okay, so my calories automatically went down to 1400. The trainer was like, okay, there's no room for sweets. There's no room for sweet treats. You know, all of this is going to be nutritionally based so I was eating 1400 calories a day starving to death, working out probably three hours a day because it was a four-week shred get the best body of your life and four weeks and I ended that program six pounds heavier than when I started. So then I was really like, Oh my gosh, like what is wrong and so all these thoughts of, you know, clearly Kasey that year that you were in that illness like that's damaged your body, your body is never going to recover. You're always going to be the Stay Puft Marshmallow mom just get used to it. So and then after that, I tried keto, I tried, you know, I just tried counting calories on my own. I tried white-knuckling my days from the time I got up until the time I went to bed and that was just miserable. I was irritable. I was angry, cranky, my kids hated my guts. So did my husband. I mean it wasn't awful. It was an awful process.

Amber B  10:56 

Yeah. And I'm so grateful that you're willing to talk about this because so many women get to that place where they've tried lots of things, and it hasn't worked. And so when you have that experience of trying something and not working, and then trying it again, and then it not working, and then trying it again, you start to develop all this evidence that is like, well, maybe I just can't do it. Or maybe my body's broken.

Kasey  11:20

And I was even going to say to you like I stopped your program. Back in January.

Amber B  11:24 

Yeah.

Kasey  11:25

And I didn't join at that time because we were going on vacation. And then I was also at that time I was on the shred. So then I was stalking you like, repeatedly emailing you and going, Amber what's this and when is it going to come back open? And so I even talked with your support staff, and I said, listen, this is my history. Like, is this something that is going to work for me because here's where I've been, here's how I feel like I'm damaged. And your support staff was so awesome. They just kept sending these messages. Yes, Kasey, you're in the right place, this will work. You know, this is you know, this is a journey. It's not four weeks, anything. So you know, if you stick with us, this wall, this will happen for you. So I took the plunge. And here I am. Yeah,

Amber B  12:07

yeah. And I think that's an important point. Because when you have a whole lot of evidence, and I'm speaking to like anybody who's listening to the podcast right now, and I'm speaking to you, you know, a couple of months ago, in this are how I would speak to a couple of months ago in this place of like, when you have a whole lot of evidence that something doesn't work, we can make that mean one of two things, we can make it mean that I'm broken, and it's never going to work, right. And I should just quit now and just learn to live with this body and just accept it. And that's not wrong like that is a choice that you absolutely can make. But the flip side of that is you can learn from those experiences and recognize that the things that you did didn't work, and that those were lessons that you needed to learn, and that we can then take those lessons to do new things right, and take new actions moving forward that are actually going to start to produce the result that you want. And so you did, you took the plunge and you even with this fear of like my body's broken is this going to work? You ended up signing up for macros 101 and so what made you cross that line? What made you try again? I guess

Kasey  13:07  

I guess I would just consider myself a hardcore like never give ever no matter what life throws at you. I just said you know what? Dang it, I'm no this is I've tried so many other things and I was looking at your website and watching people and all the transformations on the Facebook group and I thought, you know, dang it, I'm just like everybody else if this is working for everybody else, surely to goodness, this is gonna work for me. So I just said, you know, fall down, get back up, try again. And let's go for it. So,

Amber B  13:39

so awesome. And so then walk us through the first little bit because I've seen you grow a lot over the experience and over the weeks that we were able to work together and that I've been able to coach you. So kind of walk us through where you were at the very beginning of the program.

Kasey  13:55 

So when I first started, I'm a little obsessive. I will just go ahead and pull on admit that so the first week I probably obsessed over oh my gosh, do I have my macros exactly right? Oh my gosh it would be 60 grams of fat or 59 and my protein be this and so for the first week I was a little scattered I would say I cannot remember you coaching me Ammber on the Facebook group and Kasey just start out with one thing like just focus on your protein in a day, I hit my protein and then I'm firing off Facebook Messenger Amber! Amber! Amber! I hit my protein, I hit my protein. And so it became easier as we went along. But I think dividing it down into baby steps, Okay, first hit your protein, then hit your calories, then add in the other macros and I think the biggest aha for me was, I'm a perfectionist. So I was like, Oh my gosh, I don't hit these macros perfectly every single day. I'm going to fail again. And so I had a hard time getting over that but there's just no way you can be perfect every day. There's no freakin way. So I noticed that you know, maybe I was off 2, 3, 4, 5  sometimes 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 and my macros and I was still working for me. And so all of a sudden, this little light bulb went off for this little mental shift happened for me like you do not have to be perfect for this to work for you. And I just thought, hell yes, because I thought I cannot be perfect. And I can still eat chocolate and I can still have gummy bears, and I don't have to be perfect. And guess what, it's still working for me. And as soon as I hit that shift, and as soon as I hit that mark, I was just off and running. So I toggle with my macros a little bit throughout the process. A little bit here, and for some reason, I always tend to go over on fat. So when they were like, just, you know, take your average, push fat up. So I did and it just continued to work. And I'm also really big into the data. So I was watching the data every week and stuff, my calories were at a certain point. I was just sort of manipulating based on that and that is really kind of set my road for the entire process. And I'm a little I even have, I'll be totally honest and transparent. I have one day where I just kind of go hog wild and I will go 500 calories, 600 calories. I don't even know if I'm supposed to say that. But one of those days every week, it was still working for me doing that once a week. And so I like those days. But yeah, it just shows you that you can have those days when I was technically calling them refeed days or gorge pays for me. And even still, it'll still work for you. So if it's a really good journey.

Amber B  16:39 

Well, and here's my question for you, how has it felt being empowered to be able to make those decisions yourself? Like, I never told you to take a day or I never told you to have like a day like that. Like I didn't tell you to do any of those things. You took control of your experience and were able to make those choices for yourself. Like how is that different from other times that you've gone through like maybe the shred program.

Kasey  17:01  

Ah, first of all, I felt awesome. So to give the control back to me versus letting the food have control was just a win for me right off the bat. But then, you know, as I was able to do that and still see the success, it was awesome. And I will tell you to like, I started those refeed days because my calories were at 1650 on the shred and there were some days that I was white-knuckling it like, oh, I can really get through this. And so, setting the ability to have that refeed day for me, like mentally just kept me going and physically kept me going. So I decided, as I said, let me just see by adding one of these days, if it will change any of the data for me. When it didn't, correction data got better in terms of measurements and weight. Yes. So I just kind of kept that going. And I only honestly only stayed in the cut for four weeks, because I couldn't physically handle it anymore. Yes, I'm in week three of my reverse. So,

Amber B  18:05  

yeah, let me just do a little bit of teaching here because we keep bringing up this term repeat. And I want to make sure everybody who's listening understands what that term means. So typically with a refeed day is a day that is at higher calories. I'm typically somewhere usually around maintenance. So when you're in a deficit, you know, the other days, and then you have one day that is more at maintenance. Typically, with refeed days, when we're actually doing a refeed day, they're typically still tracked. And there's typically still like you're hitting certain numbers, they are just a little bit higher than your normal numbers. And this does two things. One, it helps mentally, to be able to have that thing to look forward to having a little bit of relaxation in terms of how you know to control your being, and then two, physically it can also reduce the amount of cortisol that your body is producing, which is the stress hormone and that can actually help sometimes with fat loss. Now, the important thing here is that Kasey tried something, and she was to let the data let her know how her body was responding to it. And this is what the thing that I think so many people miss in this process is they think, oh, a refeed day, I'm going to do that, or they here’re something, they're like, oh, I'm gonna try that, I'm gonna try that. And it's so important to recognize that, yes, we can, like try these things out and test them out and take action. But then if we're not gathering that data and looking at the data and looking at how our body is responding to that, we're not going to get as good as results. So that's what Kasey did. She took action. She started doing these refeed days she looked at the data, she looked at the data was telling her from her body and how it was fitting in with her lifestyle and her goals and customize it to that

Kasey  19:38

Can I add something else too Amber because I think part of that process was so important for me, I just your voice kept ringing in my head, even if you have a refeed day, you track it. Track for every few days would have sent me on a binge and I would just eat everything inside and not tracked it but I tracked every single thing that went into my mouth. Even though I'm on Sundays, I would look and go, Oh my gosh, you've eaten a lot today. But that's so helped me know, that data became so important to help me know and the next week or the following week, where do I need to be so I'm so thankful looking back that I didn't let the mindset go, oh my gosh, you need a piece of apple pie and not just eat the whole thing, you loser. I just tracked it and I was able to say it's just part of the journey, just track it, get over it and move on and see what the data says next week.

Amber B  20:28  

Yeah. And going back to something that you said a little bit earlier, I really wanted to touch on it is this idea that I'm just like, you know, other things, other diets where it's like, you have to you know, do x y & z and these are good foods and these are bad foods, macro counting can very much become a diet. When you start to view it from the perspective Kasey that you kind of had come in where it's like, these are my macros and I like to have to hit them exactly on or it's not going to work. And you can very easily turn macro counting into a diet and what you started to learn was that that perfectionism was actually like working against you. And I kind of liken it like if you think that you have to be perfect in order to get results is kind of like thinking that you can go surfing without getting wet, right? Like, if you're going to go surfing, you're going to get wet. And if you're going to like to take new action and try new things, like it's not going to be perfect and thinking that it's going to be perfect is actually going to hold you back from taking those actions. So I love that. So will you share with us kind of what both I would love to hear physically, what are some of the successes that you've had in Macros 101 as well as mentally?

Kasey  21:33 

Okay. So physically, I've been astonished in so many ways. So like I said before, I was only in a cut for four weeks because I knew just on my diet history that probably even before I started macros, and I was ready to run launches, probably were lined up as a reverse for me. So I only stayed in the cut for four weeks. And I'm in my third week of our reverse. So I started my cut at 1650, my calories are now at 1850. And overall, I've lost 15 and a half inches. And the scale has dropped 2.1 pounds. So in fact, Amber and I were talking about this before we started the call, like, it's astonishing to me that I lost 15 and a half inches, the scale has only moved to 2.1 pounds. And actually, you know, as I said, I'm so glad that I tracked so many different pieces of data. Because if I had gone through this entire process and only seeing the scale move 2.1 pounds, I would have been very frustrated because my measurements have changed so significantly. Like I'm just dumbfounded, like, I'm so excited, but I'm dumbfounded at the same time. But I think even more so for me, beyond the physical changes have been the mental changes. So what I mean by that is that my relationship with food was so distorted before I got into this but now I there's nothing off-limits to me like before, I would say I can't have chocolate, can't have candy. Those are bad things. But now I just put them in, I fit them in, there's really nothing that I don't want during the course of the day that I cannot have. That is so freeing to be able to have that. The other big mental shift for me it's just been really mental but I will say it's a more of a family thing is that I used to be the mom who restricted calories so much. By the time I got to dinner, I was a failure because I have eaten too much during the day. And I never ever ever sat down with my family and I might get a little emotional here. But my kids would say to me, Mom, why aren't you eating with us? And I would just say, you know, honey, mommy's full or you know, I've been you know, I've already eaten dinner and I just like things are pushing out on my plate and not we eat and now because of macros. Sorry. I'm eating with my family again. So I'm eating dinner. We're sharing that time. And so I've just gotten so much more out of macros and just inches lost or pounds lost or whatever that might be. So, um, that's been the most exciting piece for me.

Amber B  24:17 

So awesome. And I think all the moms are probably tearing up with you because we, you know, a lot of you, you're not alone, right. But that is a common thing I hear from moms especially as they're like, I want to eat dinner with my family. That's an important part of the process for me. And this is where we can get into talking about creating that lifestyle that fits with you and that lifestyle that you want. And that was an important non-negotiable for you. And I love that we've been able to make that happen at the same time with losing and I told Kasey that I love that you've lost 15 inches and only to only, you know, “only 2.2 pounds”. Because it's such a great example for so many women listening that you cannot just go by the scale. What Kasey is doing is losing fat and simultaneously gaining back that muscle. And that's exactly what we want to do like that. That's huge that is changing your body shape and your aesthetic without seeing a ton of weight loss on the scale. And that's super, that's super exciting.

Kasey  25:19

My progress pictures have changed pretty dramatically when I first started to now, and as I said, I still look at those progress pictures, you know, there are only two counts. Like it still, it's, it's amazing to me so.

Amber B  25:34  

I will never get old, it will never get old for me to see progress pictures where it's like the difference is like no difference in weight, and then visually there's such a difference like that it never gets old for me to see. I think the more we can see that as women and be able to take that correlation away, that weight loss and fat loss are not the same things. It's such a more powerful place for us to be in. So during the experience inside of Macros 101, what, you kind of talked a little bit about this idea of perfectionism and how that was kind of a pivotal moment for you, were there any, like any other big aha moments that you can really identify where you're like, Oh, this kind of like rocked my world and changed things for me.

Kasey  26:14  

So that was silly. But my other big aha moment was around an apple pie. So I remember eating dinner one day with a family and then dessert was apple pie. And I thought, okay, cool, you know, this will fit in my macros. And so I had a slice and I literally as I'm sitting there eating and feeling full and as I said, I don't want any more. This realization just smacks me in the face. Like, I physically and literally and mentally do not want anymore. Like, it made me tear up at the moment because that was an I have never, ever, ever been in my entire life. Like I said before, I would have eaten that one piece of pie and I would have been like, okay, you suck because you are not supposed to eat this bad food, which would have sent me off the rails, eating four or five slices of apple pie, and just beating myself up because I was a failure. But at that moment, it was the coolest thing ever to say, wow, I ate it. And I'm done. Like, I'm done. I don't even want anymore and to be able to walk away, hit my macros for the day with apple pie was so cool. So that was another big aha even though it's around apple pie.

Amber B  27:30 

Oh my gosh, no, I love it so much. Because in case either what I'll tell you because I talk to a lot of women, and this idea that like I could never get to that place Kasey, I could never get to that place of having enough, right like so many women are like, I don't even know how that would that could happen for me to get to the place where I don't want anymore. And it is possible. And that's what Kasey's sharing is like, she'd never been to that place either where she was like, I don't want anymore but that doesn't I mean, it's impossible to get there and she was able to get there and that's why it was such a powerful moment for you because previously.

Kasey  28:07

yeah, I was just gonna say like for me to like before all of this like it would have been one granola bar when it turned into five or six granola bars would have been turned into one or two Oreos to the whole sleeve of Oreos to then Oh, let me just try some ice cream to eat the whole half gallon. And I'm not joking when I was that, I was in that place because as soon as I ate that first granola bar, it would start you're a failure. You didn't meet your goals now just go on and morph down the whole box of granola bars to failure. And so the mind shift for me has been transformational.

Amber B  28:40

So awesome. Now you mentioned eating dinner with your family. And how awesome that is. I'm curious for you as a mom how have you been able to find that balance with counting macros and being a mom and having you know your kids seeing you count your food and like I know for a lot of women stuff comes up with that. So I'm curious how you've navigated that in your life.

Kasey  29:07 

So, it's been a really interesting dynamic shift because like I said, in the beginning, I used to be such a perfectionist, and I used to pre log everything, like my days, everything. And if something happened and wouldn't change it up for the day, like it would throw me for a loop a little bit. But now I've gotten a little bit more flexible in that where I don't plan the whole day, I may plan some big pieces of each meal, but I allow some flexibility to hit my macros perfectly. And I'm okay with that. Because I've seen so much success with just what I'm doing. So just like I plan some of my days, but not all of it, just knowing that you're just gonna have things in there that aren't that are going to disrupt you.

Amber B  29:48

Yeah, yeah, you're being flexible. Which is exactly, exactly the point. Um, okay. I'm curious, is there something in your fitness journey, or specifically as you like, got into Macros 101 that seemed really hard for you at first, that you're able to master

Kasey  30:07

I think honestly the hardest thing for me coming in was the belief that if I didn't do this perfectly, it was not going to work for me.

Amber B  30:18

Yeah.

Kasey  30:19

Because the fitness part of it I've always had so you know, as we were kind of working through macros and then bringing back into workouts, I knew I was gonna master that because I actually I love that like, I love working out. I love weightlifting, so I knew that was going to be fine. But for me it was working through mentally Okay if I don't do this perfectly, and I don't hit all these macros perfectly, and I pre-plan every day and I don't, you know, just eat exactly what I'm going to log or log exactly what I'm going to eat, then I'm going to fail. And so the first few weeks were hard, and I had to do a lot of macro Tetris. But then as I started to see results, even with not being perfect I finally said, Okay, I don't have to be perfect. And I don't have to obsess over this. And I can still be okay. So that part was really hard for me. But then, as I got over the hump, you know, it's so much better now.

Amber B  31:15 

Yeah, that's awesome. All right. Last question for you. I'm curious, what are some goals that you're currently working on right now?

Kasey  31:23 

I'm working on getting really strong.

Amber B  31:25  

Yeah.  What I've love to hear.

Kasey  31:27  

And so I love so today was my going into the third week of my reverse. And like we've already talked about, I lost another inch this past week, but my scale went up a pound. But I'm like, I don't care like I am loading up on the calories today because my goal is to get really strong and I'm getting really heavy. And I'm into six days a week of lifting heavy and I love it.

Amber B  31:54 

So awesome.

Kasey  31:55 

That's where I am.

Amber B  31:56  

That's so exciting. I thought of one more question that I wanted to ask you. So you said that you work full time as a psychologist. And I'm curious, we actually had someone reach out and he's like, I really want more people on the podcast who work full time who don't like stay at home moms, because it's a different dynamic, right? Like it's you're balancing different things and different priorities when you're a full time working mom, and you have those various responsibilities. So how were you able to manage that and balance working full time, hitting your goals, being a mom, and doing all the things?

Kasey  32:28 

Um, so this is where having a little bit of a perfectionist comes into having a good side. So I'm very structured. So especially when homeschool hit you know, when we went into that,

Amber B  32:39

oh, and homeschool? I didn't even think about that. It’s a quarantine.

Kasey  32:43

So my work is, so we have a chalkboard in the kitchen every day. So we had 22 video conferences a week with my kids, 22. So I'm working full time and they had 22 video conferences. I'm trying to manage this. So we had a chalkboard and everything was just written out for each, Kru, Kole, and Kale, here are your classes today, here's what you need to do. I just sort of just, I have the flexibility of being able to sort of schedule my calls and my meetings as I need to. So I just made sure that I carved out an hour for me every day to be able to work on this, to work towards my goals, to set what I was gonna do for the day. And I just never looked back because that I had you had to do it, you had to structure your days. You had to just find that meantime for you and balance it all. So it was nice because I'm actually traveling a lot so when COVID came they put us on travel lockdown, so I haven't been traveling as much. So that's giving me for me, that's gonna be more time and home. So I've been messing around but we just had to really structure our days and work through it. Yeah,

Amber B  33:50

yeah, that's so good. Awesome. Well, okay. So this is the very last question. If there is somebody who is if you could go back and speak to the woman who you were in January, right? So there's someone who's listening to this episode, who is essentially you in January? What would you tell that woman?

Kasey  34:11

I would say, wherever you are, just jump in and do it. But take all your beliefs, take all your past failures, put them in a box and put them on the shelf and just say, Okay, this is a new day, and I'm going to try it and it will work. It will work for you. Like, I can't tell you how many programs, how many things that I have,  “failed at” and I thought, Oh my gosh, am I going to fail at this too? And I just had to compartmentalize and say, okay, here failures, here crappy mess. You go in the box, tow away on the shelf and tomorrow, okay. And I'm going to try this and I'm going to give it my best shot. And I did and I'm so glad that I did.

Amber B  34:52 

Yeah, that's so awesome. Thank you so much, Kasey, for coming on and sharing your story and talking to us about your journey. I couldn't be more excited for you and the results you've gotten and what's going to happen with you in the future. That's I'm super excited for you getting strong and having a feeling strong and looking strong. That's so exciting for me. So thank you so much for coming on.

Kasey  35:14

You are so welcome, Amber. Thanks for having me.

Amber B  35:16 

Thank you so much for being here. Wasn't that an awesome episode, I loved hearing what Kasey had to say and sharing her results, both physical and mental. Because I don't have to tell you, those are both incredibly important in your journey. And oftentimes those mental results or those mental shifts that you have ended up leading to the physical results. And I think you see that really clearly in Kasey's case, as she talked about that shift for away from perfectionism and how that mental shift was what allowed her to be able to then get the physical results that she had gotten where she's, you know, changed the composition of her body and maybe not lost a lot of weight, but has lost a lot of fat. And the fact that fat and weight aren't the same things is such an important reminder and hopefully, that was a good reminder to you as you're going through your journey to be taking data from multiple sources. If you are currently only using the scale as your only data point, you are missing the bigger picture and you know you may be getting frustrated when there's nothing to get frustrated about, which is why it's so important to be taking multiple pieces of data and really enacting, constructing it into a brighter picture of what's actually going on with your journey.

Amber B  36:26 

If you are interested in joining Macros 101 we do have our Fall Enrollment coming up and if you're interested in that definitely get on the waitlist go to www.bicepsafterbabies.com/waitlist and then make sure that you're getting the emails because that's how we stay in contact with you and let you know about when we are opening enrollment so that you can come and join Macros 101.  Macros 101 is more than just learning about macro counting. We do teach you about the process but even more importantly, we teach you how to take the tool that is macro counting and apply it to your unique circumstance, right, you have a unique body, your body is going to respond differently than other people, you have a unique lifestyle that you want to choose to fit it into, and you have unique goals. And so you can't just take, you can't just set your macros and then follow them and expect grand things to happen. You need to be able to customize them to your body and your lifestyle and your goals over time. And that's what we teach. And that's what I coach you through specifically inside of Macros 101, we take principles I teach you, you know, there are three pillars I teach you content, obviously, you need to have the knowledge, that's really important. But if you don't have an application of that knowledge, I don't have to tell you, nothing's gonna change. So in addition to the content, the second pillar of Macros 101 is coaching that we're going to actually coach you in. For me coaching is taking a concept or knowledge that you have and actually helping you apply it to your situation. And so we have coaching you can get personalized coaching inside of Macros 101 to be able to take the concepts and figure out how to apply them to your situation. And then the third pillar is the community and surrounding yourself with other women who are achieving goals and who are investing in achieving goals. And there's such power in surrounding yourself with people who are rising, right? You rise with the people that you're being surrounded by. So between content and coaching and community, that's how we get clients results like we got Kasey are like Kasey did because she was willing to invest and surround herself with people who are doing the same thing. And she remained open and coachable during the process. And that's what we do for our clients. That's how we help our clients to get results physically, mentally, and to create that transformation that they want in their life. So again, if that sounds interesting to you, and you would love some help in reaching your fitness goals, get on the waitlist at www.bicepsafterbabies.com/waitlist and we will be opening up the doors very soon. So definitely make sure that you're following me on Instagram. At biceps after babies are on Facebook, which is also biceps after babies and checking your emails because there is some fun stuff that's coming down the pike and we'd love to see you inside of macros 101.

Amber B  39:12 

That wraps up this episode of biceps after babies radio. I'm Amber now go out and be strong because remember my friend, you can do anything.

Outro

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