5 Weight Loss Tips for Busy Moms

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Losing weight is tough enough when you don’t have any responsibilities, but throw in motherhood and it seems like a herculean task! Whether you’re a stay at home parent or a working mom, there’s a lot on your plate from managing your household to taking care of your kids – if you’re a working mum, you also need to balance your work life. To top it all, your natural maternal instincts drive you to be “supermom” at all times, even at the cost of your own health and wellbeing. Time and again, you tell yourself that you need to make weight loss a priority but you don’t get around to making a plan. The good news is that you don’t need to overhaul your life in order to lose weight; you can start with small changes that will have a lasting impact. 

 5 Ways to Lose Weight… without Losing your Sanity! 

• Use Natural Weight Loss Supplements 

When you’re struggling to shed a few pounds, “fat burners” may seem like a miracle cure. However, these supplements contain artificial compounds that can cause a wide variety of health issues including anxiety, high blood pressure, and even acute liver failure. On the other hand, you can use a natural weight loss supplement to help you achieve your weight loss goals. Natural weight loss supplements are not as attractive as fat burner pills because they don’t make tall claims, but using these supplements daily can make a world of difference. 

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• Set Small Goals 

Whether you need to lose 20 lbs or 200 lbs, don’t focus on the end result. Instead, create small and realistic goals so that weight loss doesn’t seem like an impossible task. According to CDC guidelines, the upper limit for healthy weight loss is 8 lbs per month but you can aim for just 2 lbs weight loss as a starting point. When you set small weight loss goals, you feel a sense of achievement each time you reach your target and this helps you stay optimistic and focused. Another option is to ignore the scale altogether and focus only on your diet and exercise and trust that you will lose weight. This tends to work well for people who have stubborn fat and don’t lose weight as easily. 

• Track your Moods and Eating Habits 

There’s nothing more satisfying than indulging in your favorite junk food at the end of a long and tiring day. You tell yourself that it’s okay to treat yourself to your “comfort food” because you’ve had a rough day and deserve a little pick-me-up. However, a recent study found that stress combined with comfort food creates changes in the brain that drive you to eat more. The team of scientists fed the same high-fat diet to two sets of mice – one group that was stressed and one group that was not stressed. Although both groups had the same diet, the stressed mice ate more and gained twice as much weight! This is why you should track your moods and eating habits so that you can learn what triggers your need for comfort food and figure out ways to overcome it. 

• Meal Prep to Save Time 

One of the most common reasons that people, especially moms don’t exercise daily is because they don’t have the time for it. Meal prepping over the weekend will mean that you have a little extra time every day – time that you can devote to a short run or a workout session. Another benefit of meal prepping is that it eliminates impulsive food choices. You’re less likely to order in when you know that you have a healthy meal that you can reheat within minutes. If you want to take it one step further, you can try weight loss meal prepping which focuses on foods that are high in nutrition but low in calories. 

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• Remind Yourself that Self-care is not Selfish 

You will need to make changes to your regular routine and lifestyle in order to lose weight. There will be times when you feel like you’re being selfish for making your weight loss a priority. This is when you need to remind yourself that self-care is healthy and that you are a role model for your kids. You can’t expect your children to make self-care a priority as they grow older if you don’t show them the way. In addition to your diet and exercise, you should also make time to relax daily and get a good night’s sleep. Again, it may seem like an impossible task, but once you make this a priority, you will find ways to make it happen. 

“Work out because you love your body, not because you hate it,” is a powerful phrase because it changes our perspective. Negative self-talk such as, “I’ll never be able to lose weight” will only make you feel bad about yourself and it will not help you reach your goals. Instead, you should replace it with positive self-talk – remind yourself of all the steps you are taking to achieve your weight loss goals and use that to stay motivated.