I get plenty of emails with questions from listeners asking either how to get started losing weight or why the methods they are using aren't working. And when I read these emails, I get to see not only what you all are thinking about and focusing on, but also how I can help. So today, I’m going to unpack common thought processes that are hindering your weight loss.

The truth is that the thoughts you have about your experience are often not based on facts. Listen in as I share what your thoughts are really based on and why people tend to be frustrated with their progress. You'll get some great insight and tips on how to look at your weight loss process in a more objective and responsible way.


Listen To The Episode Here:


In Today's Episode, You'll Learn:

  • The theme I noticed in the emails I get from listeners and clients
  • What I actually read and understand about you from your emails
  • How blame and belief are involved in your weight loss journey and the experience you have
  • What is keeping you from starting the weight loss program
  • Why some clients see their weight loss process as easy and others see it as difficult
  • The thoughts that are bogging you down and slowing your weight loss

Featured In This Episode:

How-to-Stop-Justifying-Overeating


Get The Full Episode Transcript

Download the Transcript


Share The Love:

  • Help improve the show by leaving a Rating & Review in iTunes (Here’s How)
  • Join the discussion for this episode in the comments section below

Read the Transcript Below:

Katrina Ubell:      You are listening to The Weight Loss For Busy Physicians podcast, with Katrina Ubell, MD, episode number 135.

Welcome to Weight Loss for Busy Physicians, the podcast where busy doctors like you get the practical solutions and support you need to permanently lose the weight, so you can feel better and have the life you want. If you're looking to overcome your stress eating and exhaustion and move into freedom around food, you're in the right place.

Well, hello there, my friend. How are you? You welcome back to the podcast. I am so happy to be able to record this for you. I have had basically no voice for almost a week. I really was ready to record this. I was about ready to need to do a rush production on this podcast because my voice just was not good, and I needed to get this out for you guys. So luckily, it is improving and I'm able to record for you.

I have had the week. Let me just tell you. Oh, my goodness. It started with my kids all going off to camp, two of them overnight. One of them is a day camper. Overnight kids went on Sunday, and then on Monday my daughter went as a day camper, and luckily this amazing camp has a bus that will come and take the kids back and forth every day, because otherwise I would never drive them back and forth.

So I brought her to the pick up, put her on the bus, off she went, and a little while later I get a call, and on my phone it says the name of the camp, and I was like, “Oh-oh, shoot. Which one is it? Someone break bone? Someone's got a fever. What is going on?”

And I picked up the phone and they're like, “Oh hi. We just wanted to let you know that we just checked her daughter, and she has lice.” And I was like, “Oh, gosh.” Okay, here we go. I knew it would be our turn at some point, right? So many years of helping people with lice and hearing all the horror stories, and there you go. It's like your whole life just come screeching to a halt, right? It's just like that record scratch, like what?

So luckily, do you know that they have these people, these lice ladies who handle the problem for you? Best money I've ever spent in my entire life. I couldn't even believe it. It was so great. We have a company here that will come to you. They weren't available. So there was another place where you could go to them. Totally fine. And we picked her up from camp, brought her there. They handled the whole thing. Literally, she left, completely, no problems, no nits, nothing left anymore. She definitely had a good case of it.

And then we all got checked, and it was a miracle. Literally, nobody else in the family had it. All of us were fine. So, so, so, so lucky. So the camp checked the boys a few more times, and they're completely fine. They didn't get it. So lucky. That was the start of it. And then, literally the next day is when I started with a cough and my voice started going. So it's just been been rough in that way.

And then I was just, over the weekend, in Orlando speaking at a Florida District ECOG meeting, which was super fun. So if I got to see you there, then hello and thank you again, but you can imagine my voice 10 times worse. It was really hard to speak for two hours. So I got through it. We got through it. It was all good, and it was amazing. But now I'm just glad that finally my voice is coming back.

It's really an inconvenience. We'll put it at that, right? It's definitely an inconvenience. So definitely improving. I think I actually have the croup virus, based on how my voice has been and no upper respiratory symptoms. Literally, just a cough. Like “Yeah, I have croup. That's probably what it is.” What are you going to do? Right? We just got to wait an let it run its course.

Okay. So I, a couple of weeks ago hosted a training, How to Lose the Weight for the Last Time, and for those few who came live, thank you so much. I hope you really enjoyed it. I taught a few weeks ago, and it was such a hit that for sure I needed to do an encore presentation. So I wanted to let you know that I am doing another version of it. It is in two days. It is on Thursday, August 15th at 8:30 PM Eastern or 5:30 PM Pacific. So again, I'm teaching, How to Lose Weight for the Last Time.

And I want to just make sure that you understand that what I teach is not what you think, right? It's not just going to be a repeat of all the things you've already heard a million times. It's not eat less and move more. It's not recipe suggestions. It's all based on science and what I know works after losing my weight myself and keeping it off and then guiding hundreds and hundreds of women physicians of all different specialties and all different backgrounds through the exact same process.

So if you missed it last time, be sure to join me this Thursday at 8:30 PM Eastern or 5:30 PM Pacific. So to register and get the link that you need to get on the call, then you can just go either to katrinaubellmd.com/August, the word August, or you can text your best email address to (414) 877-6220. And then when you get the text back asking for the code word, you just text back August, like the word August, the month. And then either way, if you sign up through texting or sign up through the website, you just check your email, and you'll get all the information that you need to join me on the call live. And you'll also get email reminders, so you don't get all busy and caught up in regular life and forget to come.

So I just want to let you know, remind you when you put in your email address, either to do it on the website or through texting, just please choose your best email address. Choose the one that you actually check. What we find all the time is people put in their garbage email address, and then they're like, “Wait, I didn't get any of the information.” We're like, “Right.” Or the one that's their work one, that has all these filters, and they don't get that kind of stuff. So just choose your best one, and that way you can get the information.

So again, either go to katrinaubellmd.com/August, or text your best email address to (414) 877-6220, and then text back the code word, which is August.

So I get a lot of emails from my podcast listeners such as yourself, all kinds of different questions, which I totally appreciate. I love that. And I notice themes. So, what's so great is that I get to see what you all are thinking about and focusing on. So I know what issues to address on this podcast to really help you. So if you've emailed in, thank you very much. You can always send me an email at hello@katrinaubellmd.com.

So what I noticed that many listeners do in their emails is, they ask me for help on how to get started losing weight, or they tell me all the things that they're doing to lose weight, but it's not working. And could I please offer a solution for them? And they often tell me that they are already eating super healthy, that they already follow most or all of the eating guidelines that I've recommended here on the podcast, and they're still not getting results. They tell me that they exercise, which is usually the Peloton for stress relief. You ladies love your Peloton. And they say they don't eat junk food and they don't eat fast food ,and they don't drink much alcohol or any at all, and they just cannot get their weight to budge.

So here's what's interesting. When you think about an email, what is it? What is an email? An email is simply a collection of the email senders thoughts. It's all thoughts. And sometimes you get a feeling in there, too, but for the most part it's just the long string of thoughts. So I get to find out not only what they say they're doing or not doing, but what they think about it.

And their thoughts are almost exclusively based in disbelief. They don't believe that there is a solution, even though they're reaching out to me and even though they don't outright write it, I can tell that they don't believe that they really can create an ideal weight body and stay there permanently. If anything, they're arguing for their frustration and their misery by telling me the long list of things they think they've tried but that they've deemed doesn't work.

And of course I understand this, because I used to be the same way. It was all focused on actions. What I did do, what I didn't do, what plan I was following, and when I wasn't following the plan, all the reasons why it made sense that I wasn't following the plan. And we've been conditioned by the weight loss industry to focus on all of these actions in order to get results. That's what the vast majority of weight loss programs place all the emphasis on, and that's why they don't help us keep the weight off longterm. They are missing a very important piece of the puzzle.

So when those of you who've emailed me sat down to write your email to me, you weren't thinking that you were going to tell me your thoughts about your weight loss struggle. You thought you were going to tell me the truth about your weight loss struggle. You thought you were just telling me the facts, like it's the news. But what you have to understand is that the way you think about your weight loss, whether it's going quickly and easily or it's slow as molasses on a freezing cold morning, your thinking is the most important thing to focus on.

The way you think about your experience and your progress and what you're doing is going to determine what kind of results you create. And we know this because we know that thoughts create our feelings. Feelings drive our actions, and actions create our results. So if you think the thought, “I'm trying everything Katrina recommends and it's not working for me,” you will feel frustrated. And when you feel frustrated, what actions do you take? What actions do you not take? You don't follow the recommendations, right? You don't get in tune with your hunger scale. So you end up eating too much. You eat foods that are off-plan because you don't believe that eating on-plan makes any difference. You don't manage your mind, and you indulge in confusion and indecision.

Then you use food to neutralize your negative emotions, so you can feel better in the moment. And the result is that you definitely don't lose any weight. In fact, you probably gained some back, and all of this just confirms your belief that nothing works for you and your body is hopelessly broken, right?

So now you might be thinking, “But what I do and whether the scale moves or not is a fact. Isn't this victim blaming? Are you blaming me for something that's outside of my control?” And my response to that is, believing that what you weigh is outside of your control is exactly the problem. There are multitudes of ways to interpret the facts of the food you eat and what the scale reads, but many of you are interpreting them in a way that completely disempowers you and ensures that you won't get the results that you want.

So this is really important to understand. Hit the rewind button a couple of times to listen to that again, if you didn't totally get it the first time. The way you think and therefore believe about your weight loss journey will 100% determine not only whether you'll get to your goal and stay there or not, but also what your experience will be of doing it.

So many of you are completely convinced that the weight loss process is basically just agony, that when you start losing weight, it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. It's an agonizing experience.

So what if I told you that I could help you lose all of your weight permanently and it would be simple and easy? Would you sign up for that? Of course, you would. One of the main reasons you don't sign up for my Weight Loss for Doctors Only program is because of fear. Fear that it will be too hard. Fear that you'll fail. Fear that your body is hopelessly broken. fear that you won't follow through or dedicate the time and effort required to get the results you want.

But here's the thing. Some of my clients find their weight loss experience to be easy and others don't. They think it's hard, so what's the difference? They're all in the same program. The difference is not how fast they lose or how much hunger they feel. It's not how much support they have at home, or what their staff brings into the office for treats, or how many drug rep lunches they have. The difference is in the way they think about it, what they decide to make their rate of loss mean, how they decide to think about setbacks and learning opportunities and mistakes that they make, what they decide to believe is possible for them in the future.

100% of this is their thinking. That's it. When you think about your weight loss as a slog, as this dreaded task that never leaves your to-do list, then that's exactly what you will create for yourself. You have to commit to examining and then deliberately managing your mind, in order to create the result you really want. And this is the part that most of you are skipping. You think you can just do it in your head, and you know that your thinking is so much better than it used to be because of applying what I've taught you on this podcast, and that's awesome, right? But you then make that mean that you don't need to do that much more of that work.

So many of my clients have told me that even though they've heard me say it so many times, it wasn't until they really committed to the thought work that things truly started changing for the better for them. It's when the pieces started finally falling into place.

So now that you realize you need to become a student of your thoughts, so that you can truly evaluate them and change them as needed, what do I suggest if you already eat healthy and exercise and still aren't seeing the results you want? Without seeing exactly what you're eating, my best guess is that you still overeat. What that means is that even though you don't eat candy and you don't eat McDonald's and KFC three times a week, you are still eating more food than your body needs. You probably eat too much after exercising. You probably eat too much of the food that you believe is healthy, because you don't think that eating a little bit more will make any difference.

Back in my Weight Watchers days, the very first time I went to Weight Watchers… This was back in Ann Arbor, Michigan, long time ago, I was good little Weight Watchers student and would go weigh in every week and go to my meeting, and I remember this one woman who was there every week asked a question about fruit. Because back in those days, fruit was something that you had to count as points. Vegetables you didn't, but fruit you did, and Weight Watchers this changed this over the years many times. So even right now, I'm not sure how they do fruit.

So I remember always counting my fruit, and then the vegetables were, quote unquote, free. Right? And this girl who is the student of Weight Watchers, always coming, always engaged, she said to the leader, “Well, I don't count fruit, though, because I mean, it's just fruit.” But that wasn't the program. The program at that time was that you were supposed to count fruit. There were points for fruit.

So she was basically saying, “I don't want to use the points for fruit, because fruit shouldn't matter.” Except it does matter, because she was asking the question, because she wasn't losing weight. Right? She was overeating the fruit. She was overeating other food because she didn't really have those points left. You see this? So it's really fascinating when our brains will do. She really thought she was following the program. She wasn't following the program.

Other areas, you are probably not in touch with your body's true physical hunger signals. So you think that overeating is normal and how you feel after you've overeaten, you think as a normal level of satiety. If you have to work through lunch or have a long case, you justify overeating when you do get to eat, because it's been such a long time since you've eaten last. You eat foods that are actually really buffers for you, but you justify eating them because you believe that they're good for you, and it's okay to reward yourself every now and then with food.

So I'm going to lay it out here really clearly for you, because so many of you come back around on these things. So here we go. Ready? Coconut sugar is still sugar. Maple syrup is still sugar. It doesn't matter how natural it is. Frozen banana ice cream is still way more bananas than any person should be eating in one sitting. Bread is still bread, even if you hand-milled the whole wheat berries into flour yourself and baked it with a 50 year old family heirloom sourdough starter. Okay?

Your thoughts are how you justify eating these things. Your thoughts are that they are healthy, that this shouldn't be a problem. Like the Weight Watchers gal, eating the fruit is just fruit. It shouldn't be a big deal. It's just maple syrup. It's natural. No, it's still sugar.

When you don't evaluate your thoughts, you don't know that this is happening. You don't realize it. You truly just believe that you're doing all of the things and still not getting results. And even though I've been giving you a bit of the Dr. Ubell smack down today, I want you to know that the most effective and efficient way to get to the heart of this issue is to have a coach like me help you. Okay?

This is why I offer what I do. This is my jam. You can't see it, but I can, and that's how I help you. I'm incredibly skilled and experienced at quickly finding the root of what's going on with you, so that you can start changing it right away. And ask any of my clients and they will agree. So I'd love to help you with this, and the best way, the soonest as the way that I can help you is by having you join me on Thursday, August 15th for my free training, How to Lose Weight for the Last Time.

Again, it's at 8:30 PM Eastern, 5:30 PM Pacific, and we will launch right into it. So to register, so to katrinaubellmd.com/August, the word August, or text your best email address to (414) 877-6220. And then when you get a text back asking for the code word, you just enter in August and send that back, the word August.

So let's solve your weight problem together. I will see you at the training. Have a wonderful week. Talk to you very soon. Take care. Bye-bye.

Did you know that you can find a lot more help from me on my website? Go to katrinaubellmd.com, and click on Free Resources.