SPEAKER_01 0:14

All right. So midlife women are already carrying a lot, lots on their plate. Work, family, relationships, aging parents, changing bodies, menopause, life admin, you know, and then we're told if we want to feel better or get stronger, lose weight, or even just take better care of ourselves, we have to add even more stuff to that list, right? More planning, tracking, lots of rules, research, decisions, and who doesn't have enough of those already? Just more things that we feel like we have to get right. So it's no wonder that looking after ourselves can start to feel like another full-time job. But when it starts to feel overwhelming, how many of us still feel like we should be able to figure this out ourselves? Or maybe we just need to try harder, right? It's like the only alternative is to manage everything on our own. And if we don't, then there's something wrong with us, or if we ask for help, we're giving away all of the control over what happens. But what if those aren't the only choices? What if getting support doesn't mean giving away control? What if it actually helps you get some of that control back? That's the question today. Welcome back to Fabulous Beyond 40, the podcast all about health, happiness, and hormones for women 40 and beyond. I am Coach Julie Medacy.

SPEAKER_00 1:39

And I'm Coach James Ellis.

SPEAKER_01 1:41

Yeah, so today we're going to talk about something we think a lot of women are going to recognize. Why does trying to take care of yourself sometimes feel like one more enormous thing you have to manage? Because, you know, you're already stretched in, right? The last thing you need is another job that means you have to figure out what you're supposed to eat. How much protein do I need? Well, are carbs good or bad this week? Um, am I supposed to exercise? How am I supposed to exercise? Am I doing enough? All of the things. And, you know, why are the things that used to work not working anymore? But somewhere in all of that noise, something that's supposed to make your life better starts making it more complicated. So today we're going to talk about another possibility, which is what if you don't need to try harder? What if you need to make it simpler? So, James, when when did this whole taking care of ourselves become another job?

SPEAKER_00 2:40

Well, excuse me. I was talking to uh one of our prospective clients the other day. She's 59. She left a really interesting corporate career, really busy corporate career. Five, eight years ago. She um she has five children. All the children are now uh uh an advanced age. Um advanced, you know, sort of like mid-twenties and below. She's always been the carer in the family. She's obviously married, happily married. Uh they've got a relatively big house, a busy house. So she left the corporate career thinking that things were going to slow down for her, but then she decided to set up her own business as well, a passion project. So within her passion project, she fulfills multiple roles, like most small business people do. She's the executor of the business, you know, she's the person who makes it happen practically. She deals with the clients, but dealing with the clients is only half the job. So she's got to do the marketing, she's got to do her accounts, she's got to book clients in, she's got to book clients out, she's got to get clients signed off, she's got to get materials in to do the thing that she does. Then she's got to look after the house, she's got to look after her husband. She's got these five kids. Her eldest two daughters have recently betrothed or become betrothed, one of them's just got married, the other one's about to get married next year. Lost a parent recently, you know. So there's all this stuff that's going on in this woman's life. So, you know, where does she fit taking care of herself in to all that business? Because right now she is a businesswoman, entrepreneur, accountant, photographer, social media person, marketeer, uh client liaison officer, um, health and safety officer, all these things, and that's even before you get to the fact that then she's got trying to run a house, trying to cook healthily on a daily basis, she's trying to be a good wife to her husband, she's trying to be a good friend to her friends, she's trying to be a good mum, she's trying to help the kids with their marriage arrangements with the younger kids, she's trying to help them go through college or school stuff. So she's got all these jobs to do. So, where does it fit in? And the truth is, within all that, much of the challenge, I think, is not often just the idea of fitting that in, it's how do you actually make it happen? Because the truth is, most of the health information we probably need is already out there, right? I know there's a lot of it, but we never know the basics. Um, and so overwhelmed always comes in because you're so overloaded at times with decisions. You know, how do you prioritize that if you're trying to think, you know, what's the right amount of protein to eat? How many sessions should I do the week in the gym? So it becomes really, really difficult when you've got all that chaos going in and trying to filter through all this information to actually just put the real basics into place that you probably already know what to do, because most of us know what to do, right? You know, eating from eating more vegetables, eating less crap, trying to exercise a little bit more. It's not stuff that any that's new, it's not earth-shattering information, is it? So sometimes it's just when all this stuff is going on, how do you filter through that? And one of the things that we see, I suppose, is you know, for many people, the challenge is you know, when you've got that much chaos going in, we tend to tell ourselves I either need to do it properly or I'm not gonna bother. I'm gonna follow the whole plan or I've failed, I'm gonna take care of everyone else, or selfishly prioritize myself, figure it out myself, give up, pass it on to somebody else, hire a personal trainer or a nutritionist or a health coach, whatever it may be, and then come across as thinking that you can't cope. Be totally in control or hand control of somebody else. So that's the problem is that so many of us view all these things as black and white. It's almost like it's got to be an on-off switch. I'm either being good or you know, I've screwed up, gone to the snapdraw work on a Thursday afternoon, which we've all done at some point in our lives, and then thrown the baby out with the bath water and gone, right? It's gone to hell on a Thursday afternoon, so Thursday night's gonna go to hell because I've already bugged Thursday up anyway, and we're gonna go and I'm gonna eat an easy, I would I don't like the word, but yeah, let's call it a cheat meal. I am gonna have a bottle up and a bottle of wine when my husband comes back or my partner comes back. You know, then I've already messed up that week, so I might as well just leave it because Friday and Saturday I'm gonna go out with my girlfriend, I'm gonna do something I've got in social machine, so I'm gonna throw that in the bin as well, and then I'm gonna get into that familiar trap once again of starting on a Monday. So we all start that next Monday with these really, really good intentions. By Thursday, we've messed up, we throw the weekend in the bin, and we try and start again on Monday. So, and part of that comes from this idea of seeing everything as black and white. So, why don't we talk about this idea then, Julie? Because we've talked about this before that you know looking after yourself, people think that it's selfish, and really it's because we know it's well worn for up now in in healthcare and in the coaching profession, put your own oxygen mask on before you put everybody else's on. And despite the fact that that has been an internet meme for the last five years, why are women still not willing to do it? Why are they so women to help every everybody else that stick when it comes to them? And I wonder if you, yeah, maybe you want to dig into that a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 8:26

Yeah, and I I mean this is a very familiar concept to me because it's it's an easy trap to fall into. And without, you know, we can't sit here and be all rah-rah. Yeah, yeah, take care of yourself first. And you know, self-care is a term that just gets bantered around and and bandied around. And I think it's starting to it's starting to have a negative connotation because, again, like you were saying, it's this either-or situation. Either I take care of myself or I take care of everybody else. But there's a lot of territory in between those two things. And I think, you know, a lot of times, and I've seen it happen, and it's happened to me, when the caregiver isn't taking care of themselves, they haven't got anything left in the tank to help other people. What they do give is half-assed, if you'll excuse the phrase, because they're just we just don't have the energy. And we can even become resentful, I think, of those responsibilities. And then when we do want to take time for ourselves, it feels like it has to be this massive thing. Instead of thinking, I just want to sit quietly for five minutes uninterrupted. You know, I mean, we can start there, right? And and think about what would you say if a friend came to you with this situation? I mean, I'm oh my gosh, I can't, I have all of these responsibilities, and I just don't know, I don't know what to do. I I should be able to do this, I've done it before. Um, you know, and I as a matter of fact, I remember working with a client and and she said to me, I just want to be in shape like I was in my 30s, and she's in her 50s now. And I said, Okay, let's let's explore that thought a little more. What's different about your life now compared to your life then? Well, I'm married, I have a son, you know, we have a bigger house, my in-laws are living with us, I have an executive-level job, you know, I'm I'm going through paramenopause. Okay, so just a few things that are a little bit different, right? What if we what if we stop looking and and trying to compare and thinking about, you know, what what do we need? The fundamentals are always the easiest place to start. And but we're we have this mindset, this this, I don't know, cultural conditioning, I guess, because women, it isn't that men aren't caregivers because they are. I mean, I look at your situation, you know, you're taking care of a lot of the things in, you know, in your household. And and I it isn't about that, but women still generally are the more likely to be the caregivers, and people rely on the women. And you think about all these changes to the body, even just a monthly cycle, and the things that happen and the ups and downs and the hormone levels, and then you think about the kids in the house and all the other things that you mentioned. But we don't have to have specific rules, right? We can look at what are the what are the fundamental things that my body needs. I was looking at this today because our dog is getting close to running out of his food, and we have to go to what I call the puppy store at the weekend to get it because we buy him a premium food because he has sensitive digestion. So we're very careful about what we feed him because we want him to be healthy and live a long life. And I thought, oh, isn't that interesting? I didn't give much thought to that today when I was making my lunch because I just wanted whatever I could slop into the bowl. I was in a hurry, I had a lot of things to do. But it's this is how we operate. And I say that because as coaches, we're not immune to these things, we're still human beings as well. But we if we stopped expecting ourselves to solve all of these problems for everybody else, and then feel like we have to figure out how to do it for ourselves, what if we had that help? You know, and when we we ask a lot of people, what would be the most helpful thing you could have? And people will say, a personal chef, you know, a house cleaner. I mean, all of these things, right? Well, why can't we incorporate some of those roles for ourselves, but not at the this is the only thing we do, maybe more of you know, how can I do a little bit of this? Where can I find a pocket of time on the weekend to set myself up to succeed so I don't have to think about it and make all those decisions during the week. Because um, because otherwise, what do we end up? We go hire a coach or we hire a personal trainer and we say, just tell me what to do.

SPEAKER_00 13:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 13:03

Right?

SPEAKER_00 13:04

And the truth is telling people what to do isn't really the the thing that most people need, it's what they want because it offers them a yeah, I don't I don't particularly care for the phrase, but it offers them an easy way out of what is uh an area where they're feeling overwhelmed is just pass it on to someone else. Whereas really you know the answer lies somewhere within learning to be to have better self-efficacy when it comes to supporting, being able to support yourself through this. So what you're already feeling is though your life's overwhelming, your body, your weight, or your health outside of your control, you're handing that control to someone else isn't necessarily the answer. Getting the right support isn't necessarily about handing someone else control. Yeah, as coaches, our job is to let our clients keep the steering wheel so they're driving the car, we kind of help them stop driving around in circles, right? We provide a sat nav for them to help them navigate things a little bit better. It's more about helping people, people filter out the noise, seeing options they might not have considered, deciding what actually matters, and finding a step that works for them because what works for you is Julie, what works for me is James, um, what works for our other female clients isn't going to work for every single single person. Yes, there are some sort of like fairly accepted norms, but people know what those fairly accepted norms are. You know, we all know that drinking less would be better for us, you know, eating less crap food would be better for us, eating more protein would be better better for us. So they're kind of like the generally accepted norms. So outside of that, what actually works for you and what can you do within your life, within your control, with the help of somebody maybe giving you a little bit of direction if you do reach out to a coach or a nutritionist or a PT, whatever it may be, what can they help guide you towards? And it interestingly, I suppose the what I'm trying to get at with all this is that you know the stuff that is meant to be simple isn't always easy, and that is where a coach can help. So, yeah, we've had a lot of clients' stories around this, Julie. Why don't you share some of those with the listeners?

SPEAKER_01 15:37

Yeah, and I I mean, like you said, the biggest differences sometimes come from doing the smallest things, and what I love about coaching is that you get a more objective view because you're so involved in all the things that are going on, you may not see patterns and things. So when we work with our clients and we can help them to see these things, they'll think say things like, Oh gosh, I never would have thought about it that way. Um, my favorite, I didn't realize I could do something that simple and it would make a difference, right? Um, others have said I couldn't have done this without the support. Um, they're fully capable. And and there have been times when when our clients have said have said, you know, it's all down to you, you know, to us as coaches, but that's not the that's not that's not true. We're the guides, but they still have to do the work. And um it's nice because it allows us to help them see things more clearly. We're more objective, we have another set of eyes, we can appreciate the struggles and we can help find maybe more creative ways to to resolve the issues that that they're struggling with. But a lot of times it's not about adding more stuff, it's about simplifying and taking things out and getting back to basics because you know we we're already facing decision fatigue at most days. We have so many things to think about. The last thing we want to do is get home. And it my my one of my favorite sayings from a a speaker I heard once is just said, home is not where you go when you're tired of being nice to people. And that and that includes ourselves, right? We we are on all day, we talk to people, we talk to clients, we we talk to people at work, whatever. And and when we get home, we just it's we just don't seem to want to expend the energy. But when we simplify, it doesn't take a lot of energy, it makes it so much easier to do the next thing, the next step. And it isn't about doing all the steps and looking at this huge overwhelming picture, it's about just taking the next step forward, and it can be tiny, and that's sometimes the best step to take. Because trying harder isn't necessarily the right way to go.

SPEAKER_00 18:00

No, it's definitely not, you know, sometimes, and I suppose that's the challenge for a lot of people, isn't it? Is that when it comes to being able to simplify things, when it comes to having lots of information, they either most people either want a solution that's given to them, but unfortunately, the way that the sort of like diet industry, fitness, health industry, whatever you want to call it, works quite often is just by giving them even more complications, more decisions to make, more things to do. And the truth is, people need just fewer things to think about, right? It's not another diet, it's not a set of rules, another promise that this time you're going to finally be disciplined and do the right thing. It's more about just having less to think about, fewer decisions, less noise, some real simple, clearer next step. You know, if you're that overwhelmed, the next step doesn't have to be that that big. I think what is helpful sometimes, and for many of our clients, that what they what they come to realize is that it's not being told what the next step is, it's just having somebody figure out, help you figure out what the next best step is for you and your your personal circumstances, right? And I suppose that gives us a a nice lead into our our latest program, four weeks later. So do you want to just tell people a little bit about that, Julie, before we head out for the day?

SPEAKER_01 19:30

Sure, yeah. And you know, we're talking about all these internet stars and and uh what do we say, influencers and stuff, they're telling you to do this, do that, do that, and all of a sudden you have all these rules. You don't need any more of that, right? When you can bring your questions and your confusion and ask about things that maybe aren't working or you're not sure, having somebody who can help you make sense of everything so that you can decide what to do next, is as James said, is really it's really important. And that's exactly why we created this program because we're not going to take control of your life for four weeks and tell you exactly what you're allowed to eat. Um, we don't need any more weighing and measuring and logging and journaling and turning everything into some kind of special equation. But when you get the right support and guidance in a much simpler way of approaching weight loss, especially at midlife, um, you don't have to spend all day thinking about it. And that I think that's part of the stress because we're every step of the way we don't know what to eat. Because when you want to get healthier, you you shouldn't have to turn the whole thing into a new hobby. You want to, you don't have to choose between being healthy or actually enjoying your life, and it shouldn't, it should never be that way. So it's one of the reasons why I love this program so much because it's so flexible and really fits into people's lives. And all our clients who've done it have had great success, and so have we, because we do it alongside our clients every time, right?

SPEAKER_00 21:02

Yeah, yeah. So this is a new improved program of an album that we used to have. We've thrown some workouts in there as well and some mindfulness exercises. So it's a really, really good program with us guiding you through it. So I suppose here's something to think about this week, then to round things off. Were you making taking care of yourself harder than it needs to be because you think you should be able to figure out everything on your own, and what might change look like if you didn't have to do that? So quick little plug. If four weeks later sounds like the kind of support you've been missing, we've got a deal on at the moment, on it, a last-minute deal for people who want to join us. Uh, in the programme, you get practical nutrition, you get daily accountability, coaching. Both of us in your corner throughout helping you make those decisions. Those decisions mostly are around 10 minutes a day, so it's really, really simple stuff. There's no calorie counting, no weighing every morsel, no diet nonsense. We also back it up with a kind of guarantee, not exactly a guarantee. What it actually does is if you don't lose weight within four weeks of the programme, we'll continue coaching you for 60 days afterwards for free to help you get to where you want. We can't say fairer than that. So, in the offer that we've got at the moment, it's normally 129 pounds. But until midnight tomorrow, Friday, that is the 18th of September. So if you listen to this next week, sorry, it's gone. We have started. Uh, but if you sign by uh by Friday, you can join for just 99 pounds, that's 30 pounds off. So prep starts this weekend. We officially begin on Monday. So if you want to join us, you can visit lighter.fablessbeyond40.com, and we'll also drop the link into the show notes. And remember, whether you join us or not, asking for support doesn't mean handing away your power. Sometimes it's exactly how you get some of it back. So that's it for this week. Thank you for joining us. We've been James and Julie from Fabulous Beyond 40, and we're here to remind you to stay strong, stay fabulous, and we'll see you next time. Take care, everybody.

SPEAKER_01 23:12

Bye, everybody.