Great post and I agree on your points, especially the one prioritizing sleep and a healthy bedtime routine. Plus, reducing eating/drinking before bedtime will not only help you sleep through the night but also reduce post-dinner snacking. What's made the biggest difference for me is reducing alcohol. For most of my adult life, I could be classified as a heavy drinker -- one beer before dinner, then my husband and I would split a bottle of wine, which is two glasses, so I was having three drinks/night. That was my norm through my 30s & 40s. I did Dry January's for a few years in a row, starting in 2020, which helped me re-evaluate my relationship with alcohol and reduced my tolerance. Plus, aging past 50 (I'm almost 54 now) reduces tolerance; now one beer gets me buzzed! The biggest thing was, I kicked my wine habit. Wine just messes with my sleep too much. Now I have at most one beer on some but not all nights. To help me do this, I discovered non-alcoholic beers. They were useful for helping me kick the habit & craving of drinking. However, I recently discovered by looking at the label they're quite high in refined carbs (14g). Now I'm trying to kick the non-alcoholic beer habit and just have sparkling water, or some nights enjoy a single real IPA. Cheers!
Love all of this. I want to do a whole separate post about alcohol because we’ve been through similar process at our house. We still have our weekly ‘wine wednesday’ with friends & our occasional weekend night on the town, but cutting out that daily habit feels so good. And it takes some doing because it is anchored to those times you really enjoy - like sitting with your partner or friends at the end of the day to decompress. Thanks for sharing your tips. We have had fun trying all the different non alcoholic beverages - some great ones out there nowadays! And, like you said, don’t want a habit of that either. I was enjoying sparkling water and grapefruit juice as a wine replacement until I learned how grapefruit impacts your detox pathways. 😜 Always stuff to learn & improve.
The good news is that as we work to improve our daily habits - food, drink, sleep, mindset - there is so much crossover between them all. Improve one and it’s going to help something else as a bonus. 🤗
Great headline! I can’t imagine there are many women our age not struggling with weight.
Thank you for such a detailed newsletter! I will come back and re-read to continue to understand what works best for women our age.
I’m already working on the sleep part, and have given up 95% of the soda I used to drink plus putting sugar in my coffee. But, I do love the idea of watching the percentage per day that most likely is sneaking in via snack and meals. That will be my mission this week. Being more mindful and seeing where else I can reduce my sugar %.
P.S. Congrats on all the extensive work your doing to be an even better health coach! 👏👏👏
Thanks Letty! Sounds like you are making some great improvements. Keep it up! Sugar is a tricky one and definitely a great place to focus. Read your labels. It’s always a surprise to see how quick it adds up over the course of a day.
Great post and I agree on your points, especially the one prioritizing sleep and a healthy bedtime routine. Plus, reducing eating/drinking before bedtime will not only help you sleep through the night but also reduce post-dinner snacking. What's made the biggest difference for me is reducing alcohol. For most of my adult life, I could be classified as a heavy drinker -- one beer before dinner, then my husband and I would split a bottle of wine, which is two glasses, so I was having three drinks/night. That was my norm through my 30s & 40s. I did Dry January's for a few years in a row, starting in 2020, which helped me re-evaluate my relationship with alcohol and reduced my tolerance. Plus, aging past 50 (I'm almost 54 now) reduces tolerance; now one beer gets me buzzed! The biggest thing was, I kicked my wine habit. Wine just messes with my sleep too much. Now I have at most one beer on some but not all nights. To help me do this, I discovered non-alcoholic beers. They were useful for helping me kick the habit & craving of drinking. However, I recently discovered by looking at the label they're quite high in refined carbs (14g). Now I'm trying to kick the non-alcoholic beer habit and just have sparkling water, or some nights enjoy a single real IPA. Cheers!
Love all of this. I want to do a whole separate post about alcohol because we’ve been through similar process at our house. We still have our weekly ‘wine wednesday’ with friends & our occasional weekend night on the town, but cutting out that daily habit feels so good. And it takes some doing because it is anchored to those times you really enjoy - like sitting with your partner or friends at the end of the day to decompress. Thanks for sharing your tips. We have had fun trying all the different non alcoholic beverages - some great ones out there nowadays! And, like you said, don’t want a habit of that either. I was enjoying sparkling water and grapefruit juice as a wine replacement until I learned how grapefruit impacts your detox pathways. 😜 Always stuff to learn & improve.
The good news is that as we work to improve our daily habits - food, drink, sleep, mindset - there is so much crossover between them all. Improve one and it’s going to help something else as a bonus. 🤗
Drink less calories and Move More are my items to work on! Thanks again Karen!!
Love it! Have a great week!
Great headline! I can’t imagine there are many women our age not struggling with weight.
Thank you for such a detailed newsletter! I will come back and re-read to continue to understand what works best for women our age.
I’m already working on the sleep part, and have given up 95% of the soda I used to drink plus putting sugar in my coffee. But, I do love the idea of watching the percentage per day that most likely is sneaking in via snack and meals. That will be my mission this week. Being more mindful and seeing where else I can reduce my sugar %.
P.S. Congrats on all the extensive work your doing to be an even better health coach! 👏👏👏
Thanks Letty! Sounds like you are making some great improvements. Keep it up! Sugar is a tricky one and definitely a great place to focus. Read your labels. It’s always a surprise to see how quick it adds up over the course of a day.