Empowering Midlife Wellness: Stephanie Lueres’ Inspiring Journey to Body Positivity and Healthy Eating Habits

What if the key to transforming your relationship with food and your body isn’t found in the latest diet fad, but in embracing body positivity and self-acceptance? Join host Heather Carey in this empowering episode of Real Food Stories, where she sits down with Stephanie Lueras, a remarkable body positivity personal trainer and fitness nutrition specialist who has successfully lost over 200 pounds through holistic approaches. Forget restrictive dieting; this conversation dives deep into the significance of cultivating healthy lifestyle choices that resonate with your personal food journey.

Stephanie shares her inspiring weight loss story, revealing how she navigated the often confusing world of nutrition advice and weight loss myths. Together, they explore the importance of small, consistent actions that lead to sustainable eating habits. Discover how prioritizing hydration, embracing home-cooked meals, and adopting mindful eating practices can transform your relationship with food and enhance your overall well-being.

The discussion takes a heartfelt turn as they highlight the pillars of body positivity and weight neutrality, emphasizing the need for self-acceptance in the pursuit of wellness. Stephanie’s insights into the emotional resilience required to overcome food confusion and societal pressures are both relatable and enlightening. They stress that true change begins with understanding your personal food beliefs and the unique journey each individual must embark upon.

As they delve into topics like menopause health and midlife nutrition, Stephanie shares her wisdom on the role of community support and accountability in achieving lasting health transformations. Learn how to find joy in movement and the importance of nurturing your body with compassion, rather than guilt or shame. This episode is a celebration of personal empowerment, reminding us that wellness is not a one-size-fits-all journey, but a deeply personal experience.

Whether you’re navigating midlife changes, looking for healthy eating tips, or simply seeking inspiration from real food stories, this episode is packed with valuable insights. Tune in for a conversation that encourages you to embrace your unique path to health, empower your menopause journey, and nourish your body with love and respect. Join Heather and Stephanie as they redefine the narrative around women’s health and wellness, paving the way for a more compassionate approach to food and lifestyle choices.

Let’s Be Friends
Hang out with Heather on IG @greenpalettekitchen or on FB HERE.

Let’s Talk!
Whether you are looking for 1-1 nutrition coaching or kitchen coaching let’s have a chat. Click HERE to reach out to Heather.

Did You Love This Episode?
“I love Heather and the Real Food Stories Podcast!” If this is you, please do not hesitate to leave a five-star review on Apple or wherever you listen to podcasts.

Transcript:

Speaker #0
Well, hello, everybody, and welcome back. And if you are just tuning in with me for the very first time, it’s so nice to meet you. And I’m really glad you’re here with me today. I am your host, Heather Carey, nutritionist, chef, mom, and a woman who has been around the block with food. I want to open up about real food in relation to health, weight, and our bodies so you can make peace with what you eat. Hi, Stephanie. I’m so glad you’re here with me today to talk to my audience about weight and body image and body positivity. So let me tell the audience a little bit about you first. Stephanie Lueras is a body positive personal trainer and fitness nutrition specialist who works with groups and individuals that feel stuck with traditional diets. yet want to build consistency and feel successful in moving toward their goals and how they want to feel in their body. After coming to a point in her own life where she was, quote, sick and tired of being sick and tired, Stephanie knew she needed some changes. Small actions and goal setting helped Stephanie lose over 200 pounds through balanced nutrition and movement without the use of restrictive dieting. commercial weight loss plans, or supplements. In turn, she gained a love of endurance sports, running marathons, and is currently training for an Ironman distance race. She uses this same holistic goal-setting model in working with clients in groups and individually to empower people to break down the everyday barriers that exist so they can achieve what they are working towards for their best personal wellness. Stephanie specializes in beginner and adaptive fitness, aiding those of all sizes, age, conditions, illnesses, and abilities. Did I get all that right?

Speaker #1
Sounds pretty good to me.

Speaker #0
Great. So let’s start with your story first. I want to hear and talk to you about what it means to also be body positive. But I know that losing 200 pounds is a huge feat. and takes a certain kind of a mindset. So why don’t we just start with you sharing about your story?

Speaker #1
Okay. Well, I’m a person that has always been overweight. I’ve been, you name the diet, I have probably tried it at least once. I’m really great at losing weight, but I’m even better at gaining it back. And, you know, in my, when I reached my mid thirties, I’m like, I’m I’m tired. I’m tired of this. There has to be something out there other than dieting that is what I thought in my mind was going to make me happy. And so I’m done, but I didn’t know what was next. And so I just started thinking about how I felt at that present time. And pretty much everything was miserable. It wasn’t just my size and my physical ability and my physical health, but it was also my mental health and my spiritual health just across the board had become very stagnant. And so I started looking around at what’s something that feels doable. Literally, the first thing I did was start to drink water, cultivate this habit of drinking water. And it wasn’t like, you know, running out and getting one of these crazy like gallon jugs and all these water challenges and things we see. I had an eight ounce cup and a kitchen timer. And whenever that obnoxious old school kitchen timer went off in my office, I had to get up. take that water glass to the water cooler, which was at like the other end of the building, and fill it up. So it was just cultivating this habit of being aware of how much I’m drinking, how often am I drinking? And then that started to feel pretty good. I’m like, okay, I got the hang of this. What can I do next? And so then it was, well, let’s focus on, Kimmy, what are we eating? I was pretty much going through the drive-thru at least once, if not twice a day to feed my husband and myself, which is not only horribly expensive, it’s not the most varied diet out there. And so I’m like, okay, I’m going to cook at home. It doesn’t matter what I cook at home, but I’m going to cook. And then as I started doing that, it was, well, let’s experiment with this or that or try these different things. and really introduce this balanced diet full of all types of foods. Even just falling into those habits, I naturally started to lose weight. I probably lost, I don’t know, 40, 50 pounds before I even decided, okay, maybe let’s do some physical movement now. But at that time, I was at… a size where mobility was difficult. And had I kept gaining weight, I probably would have lost my mobility. So in my mind, the only thing that I could do was walk. And so I walked to the end of the street back, thought I was going to die. But I kept doing it to the end of the street. And that became around the block around the neighborhood further and further. And as I built up that stamina and difference one day I’m like you know I wonder if I can run now I think sick in gym class this was not a thought that would ever come naturally to me but in just again that that first step of running you know going to like a stop sign like 50 yards down the road something in me clicked and I’m like this is something that I think I’m gonna like I’m going to enjoy. And so I really cultivated this habit of running, which then morphed into 5Ks, 10Ks, half marathons, marathons, and then jumping over into triathlon for a new challenge, because I really enjoy those long endurance workouts. Don’t tell me to go run a mile because I don’t get settled in my head and in my movements in just that little amount of time. Send me out for a few hours at a time and I’m solving the problems of the world because it just, that’s that calm place for me. But alongside those physical habits came looking at the rest of my wellness, that mental and emotional wellness in that space. spiritual wellness because in improving one area, it was how am I going to bring up those other areas? So it was looking at things like, am I dealing with my relationship with food? The reason why I continue dieting in the first place. And I also have PTSD. And so really looking at how does that show up in my daily life? How do I cope with that? And then just that spiritual health, you know, where am I connected in this world? What do I believe? And how does that, how is that shown in all that I do? So through this process, I didn’t necessarily focus on the weight at all. The weight takes care of itself. When we’re engaged in the habits that help us to feel good and to feel how we want to feel.

Speaker #0
Wow. I mean, that’s a big, you know, that’s a lot. I mean, and, you know, just, I think number one, starting with small steps, right? Always a great idea. And you just started with an eight ounce glass of water.

Speaker #1
Yeah.

Speaker #0
Fantastic. But you then transitioned to looking at your food and doing less drive-thrus and takeout to then your physical. and then running 5Ks and then going even longer to your mental and emotional, to your spiritual. That takes a lot of dedication. I’m just curious, did you have support? Was your husband supportive? Was he in on it with you? How did you get this incredible mindset shift?

Speaker #1
One of my favorite words is accountability. Accountability comes from a lot of different places. My husband is incredible. He is my biggest cheerleader. He will support me in any crazy idea I come to him with. But just the nature of knowing him in our relationship, I would never have the expectation that he was going to do something alongside me. Because we both have different approaches to things. And so for me, it was a decision. Well, if it means I’m cooking two different meals or two different parts of meals, that’s the way it was for a little while until he started to see the difference. things that I was eating. And he’s like, Oh, well, just make that for me too. And so even that modeling, he was able to make some changes for himself. But that accountability piece, we can’t depend on our support in just one area. And like, I look at it as a whole team effort. You know, my, I have. an incredible physician that I can come to with any questions, any concerns, and we’re going to work it out. We’re bringing the people that I need to support me in that. The other thing is, you know, on that physical side, I have a sports dietitian that specializes in mindful eating and intuitive eating, which is something that’s very important to me. I have a coach that understands what it’s like to train in a larger body and some of the different dynamics that that raises that a typical athlete wouldn’t necessarily face. I have those spiritual mentors. I have my church community. Therapy is a beautiful thing. I have a great therapist. And also, even in that, just creeps and places where you find people that are going through the same things that you do. That’s all those places that keep me focused on what I want and am I moving to get there?

Speaker #0
Yeah. Well, so thanks for sharing that, that you have different almost accountability partners in a way, you know, from all different areas. And I think that is so important. And then having you community, that you’re not doing things alone. But I also think that you have to be, you have to be accountable to yourself too, right? And that that’s where the mindset comes in, that you feel like I can do this rather than I can’t. And so it sounds like you just have incredible, you know, your own accountability to yourself. I think that’s, we have to have. compassion and kindness, right? And forgiveness, right? First and foremost for ourselves.

Speaker #1
I think that accountability to yourself comes back to my favorite question in the book. How do you want to feel? Because it’s never that I need to, I have to, I should, all of this pressure that we put on ourselves. Who tells me that I need to do this? Who’s telling me I have to? have to do this. But when you look at it through the lens of how do I want to feel, it makes it really easy to stay the course in something that you know is going to make the difference in changing something or maintaining something that that’s working for you.

Speaker #0
Yeah, excellent question. And it’s one that I asked myself. daily and just to the people that I also work with, right? How do you want to feel? And I imagine that after being on and off countless diets, I mean, that’s not how you wanted to feel, right? That’s frustration and struggle and a lot of emotion. So you did a fantastic job of really pivoting and then looking at all the different areas of your life. So it sounds like then, you know, you had this amazing, positive experience. And did this transition into what you do now?

Speaker #1
It did. Because as I changed, as I grew and basically became more whole, I realized that the environment that I was in, the career that I was… that I was working with this organization was was pretty toxic. and very damaging, not only to my physical health, but to my mental and emotional health. And, you know, it was, it was a hard decision, but it, it was something that I knew it was time to go. And my husband, my husband and I worked together and we, you know, he was, he was having some similar thoughts from some things that he was experiencing as well. And so. really sat back and we said, okay, well, if we’re not going to do this, what are we going to do? And for my husband, he entered into the workforce and, you know, isn’t a job that he loves. And I couldn’t be more happier. But for me, it was, how do I take what I’m doing and continue to serve? And as I’ve gone through my journey, I mean, this is like, six, seven years now that, you know, people would always say to me, you know, you have to tell me what you’re doing. You have to show me what you’re doing. But I couldn’t within the parameters of the previous position I had. So I started to look at, well, what would that look like? How could I serve people in showing them what I’ve done and what potentially please. could work for them. And even through the process of what I’ve done for myself, I got my certifications, I got the nutrition, you know, all of these other things, you know, I just keep stacking them up because I’m like a super nerd. But these are the things that I wanted to understand what all these other people were teaching me about my body. So taking that, putting it into a coaching framework. of walking alongside others in what is it that you need? How do you wanna feel? How do we find that? Because it’s different for everyone. I have zero expectation that someone is gonna go out and become a runner or become a cyclist or do these other things. But for them, it might just be getting their body moving, looking at how they’re gonna do it. how they can be serving food for their families in a different way. There’s so many different avenues to look at.

Speaker #0
We’re starting with just drinking a glass of water. It’s a tiny, tiny step like that. Yeah, so it sounds like you meet people where they’re at. And everyone’s individual. And I think that’s also a really great point to drive home, that we’re all individuals, right? Being on a diet means you’re following someone else’s rules. Everyone has to follow the same plan. But, you know, it sounds like your approach is totally individual, which is how it how I believe it should be as well. So I know that you do not endorse a specific diet or, you know, because you’ve been there, done that. But talk to me about body positivity. I was curious about that just for my audience. Please. Is body positivity a, I mean, it’s not a diet, but is it a way of life? Is it a philosophy?

Speaker #1
So body positivity has really taken on this buzzword persona and crossed over into diet culture and beauty culture. And… All of these other things that send us down that rabbit hole of I’m not enough. I need to do X, Y, Z to be acceptable. Instead of looking at things with that term body positivity, I’m really starting to make the shift more weight neutrality and body acceptance because we are not going to implement. lasting change, we are not going to be very clear and honest with ourselves. If we can’t accept what is in the present moment, you know, we we can mourn our college body, we can, you know, it’s okay to look back at different points in life and think, wow, that, you know, I want to get back to that. But do you really want to go back and be 21 again? I sure don’t. But It’s becoming very present in the here and now, and it might not be all sunshine and roses when you realize what things look like right now, but it’s that great springboard to what’s possible. What can I look at? What can I change? How do I want to feel? It’s not dictated by a number on the scale. It’s not dictated by a way of dress or a status symbol. It truly comes back to that place of being comfortable in your own skin. And are you able to do the things you want to do? And if you can’t, then how do we make that happen? So it’s really almost stepping back from… the fairy tale and looking at what is right now so that I can be who I want to be.

Speaker #0
I just want to get clear. Are you saying body positivity has gotten a little skewed? Like it’s started out, right? Because I remember this too, you know, this like concept of body positivity. And, and I think what I heard you saying was that then it you know, filters into the diet industry and the beauty industry and it’s on social media and really what is underneath it, I think is what you’re saying is that like, I’m not enough. Like I still need to be like something different. And so then it’s, it’s, you’re off shooting into like weight neutrality and just body acceptance.

Speaker #1
And, and, you know, in, in my definition of body positivity without everything that we see on social media today, that body positivity is that body acceptance. It is fully living life in the here and now, you know, yeah, we may be working on to change some things. There may be some desires to look at some different things in our lives, but that pause button hasn’t been hit that we’re not living life right now.

Speaker #0
Right. So, and being, accepting yourself where you are right now, I think is incredibly important, right? Because we can’t go back to our 21 year old self where I have, I sometimes just say, I wish I just want to be how I looked when I was 30. But you’re, but now you’re almost 60 and it’s not, you’re just not going to be, your body’s different, your body, you know. There’s different changes going on. And so we have to accept ourselves right where we are right now, no matter what our weight is at, our energy, our physical. It can always shift, but starting with acceptance is an incredibly important first step.

Speaker #1
Our bodies are pretty darn smart. If we’re doing… what our body truly needs. If we are engaging in those habits that serve our body in the best way, it figures itself out. Our body transforms into what it wants to be. We don’t have to be the ones to have that rigid control over it.

Speaker #0
Right, exactly. I totally agree with that. If someone was you know, coming to you there, the very beginning stages, like you were, you know, back in the day, what’s the best advice you would give them? I mean, would you start with something very small, like start with water, you know, or because I know, you know, it’s like, I think when you, you described all your things, it’s a, that’s a lot to the food, this. spirituality, the, you know, like the physical, the like, what would be a good starting point? I have imagined you’re going to say, I mean, it’s very individual and wherever, you know, someone wants to start.

Speaker #1
It is very individual, but at the same time, it’s also something that is similar across the board. It’s always starting with a place that isn’t going to disrupt. someone’s lifestyle. Because we think about things like diets, like New Year’s resolutions, like all these things where we institute this framework. onto our lives. And it might work for a little while. We can stick to it. We can hold this plan and white knuckle it for a little while. But ultimately, it doesn’t last in the long term. Taking something that has some great elements, but it doesn’t fit our life. And that happens for a lot of reasons. Our schedule, our finances, our responsibilities, our family, children, whatever that looks like. So that starting point. Whatever it is, that’s really determined by what someone wants to achieve is what is it that fits in life today? You know, exercise is the easiest example. For somebody that’s not exercising, it is absolutely unrealistic to expect that person is going to add in 45 or 60 minute workouts four or five days a week. not something that’s going to happen. But we can probably find 30 minutes a couple times a week, 15 minutes, even more frequently through the week. And starting in that very small place where it’s easy to start to pencil into the calendar, it starts that momentum of consistency that you’re doing it over and over. It has a cumulative effect. effect. The more you do it, the better you feel. The better you feel, the more willing you are to open up that space to make more time for it. So it’s really starting to introduce things into daily life in a gentle way that doesn’t throw everything else off to the side. And then you get frustrated because you can’t keep it all together.

Speaker #0
Yeah. So I mean, starting with those really Again, those small steps, but I know that some, I have some clients, many clients, they come to first to see me that say their biggest goal. And I know you’re, you know, you come from that weight neutral standpoint. Their biggest goal is I want to lose weight and I want to lose a lot of it, you know? And so can you do that for me in 30 days? You know, like, and so sometimes trying to convince people that it’s like those small steps. doesn’t feel like enough. It’s like too slow going. It’s, you know, they want, they want their fast results because they’re used to being on diets that, that can give you fast results, but you know, you go off the diet and it’s, you’re back to where you were.

Speaker #1
Yeah. And, you know, I’d be lying if I didn’t say the number one request of people walking into my office was I want to lose weight, but more often than not. When we have a deeper conversation, it’s not about the weight. It’s not about the scale. And my favorite question is why? You know, why do you want to lose weight? You know, keep asking it several times. I forget the gentleman that, you know, talks about the seven whys. And we keep getting deeper and deeper. But a lot of times, somebody will walk in the door. say I want to lose weight but then we start to unpack that a little bit and it’s I want to be able to keep up with my kids or my grandkids you know I just you know my I have aches and pains I want to manage a chronic condition probably one of the biggest things I hear not just from older ages but across the board is I want to be able to get up if I fall And I never realized that was such a big fear with so many people. So when we step back from what was that first reason and start to look at, okay, why are we really here? Then we start to see that starting point. Well, if somebody is afraid of falling, wants to be able to get up, build that strength, there’s a lot of things we can do. do that in a lot of different areas that’s going to build those habits, it’s going to build that strength and confidence, the weight is going to take care of itself. The other thing too, is weight doesn’t exist in a vacuum. I mean, the scale simply is a measure of our gravity. And so we have to look at, you know, what, what is your measure of success? besides that number.

Speaker #0
And so it’s looking at other benchmarks. You know, is it a body composition change? Is it these clothes are fitting a little bit better? Or I’m not huffing and puffing, running up the stairs, things like that. What can we celebrate? For even those people that still are like, I need to lose weight and I need to lose it quick. Fine. I’ll tell you how to do it. But then when it fails. we’re going to try it my way. So you start to see how people think things through a little bit differently when it starts to get hard and they’re like, okay, well, maybe there is something different.

Speaker #1
Right. Yeah. No, I like that, you know, measuring success and it doesn’t mean the number on the scale. I mean, there’s so many other ways to measure success, but you know, in our society. Unfortunately, the number on the scale like means so much, but it sounds like with your way of looking at things and the way that you coach people, right, this is such a great first step that people need to know their why. Why are they doing this, right? And I don’t want to fall. I’m fearing falling. I want to be able to get on the ground and play with my grandkids. I mean, yeah, these are… These are the things I talk to about my, with my clients as well. And that means not just going on a diet, you know, to lose weight. That means so there’s so many other things that surround that. So it’s, I think you’re doing such great work because this is the direction. I think that body image and making just peace with food. and weight and everything needs to go. We are just, I know we contend with the multi-billion dollar diet industry, but hopefully, you know, we’re making small steps in other directions. So I really appreciate your story, Stephanie. I think this has been fantastic and sounds like you’re just doing amazing work. How do people get in touch with you and how do you work with people?

Speaker #0
So I work with people virtually as well as in person here in Lake Havasu City, Arizona. But I work across all the time zones that that’s usually not an issue. But, you know, I’m I’m out there. If you want to find me, you can. All the social media networks. You know, my my business, Heart and Soul Fitness and Wellness. Soul is S-O-L-E. my website, heartandsoulfit.com. And, you know, all of my inboxes are open. Those messengers are open. Shoot me a question and, you know, let’s have a conversation. I always have a free consultation for people that even if they haven’t figured out yet what they’re looking for, let’s have a conversation because if it’s not something that is in my lane, I have a referral network of people that I know that I trust that, you know, we’re going to get you what you need to whatever it is, if it’s wellness, if it’s, you know, some other area of, of support that you need, we’ll get you there.

Speaker #1
Fantastic. Well, I’ll make it even easier. I’ll put all your links in the show notes too. So people can just quickly find you that way as well. So Stephanie, thank you so much. I appreciate you being here and talking about a really important topic.

Speaker #0
Thank you.

Speaker #1
Have a great day.

Speaker #0
You too.

Speaker #1
And as always, if you loved this podcast, please consider gifting me with a five-star review. It is so helpful for me to get the word out. on real eating, our real bodies, and real food stories. Thank you so much and have a great week. Bye for now.