 Hi friends, welcome back to my channel and a very special welcome if you're new here. My name is Jen, I'm a Certified Weight Loss and Nutrition Coach. I'm on Weight Watchers and I track calories and macros. Happy Friday, it is Friday, so it is weigh in day. Talk about my week and the WW workshop topic. So if you're excited, give this video a big thumbs up. Subscribe if you're not because we do a weigh in every Friday and I upload five videos every single week. Down in the description box, I will link nutrition coaching where I offer personalized macros and calories. Highly recommend, this is how I've lost over 90 pounds in one year, as well as one-on-one coaching for accountability and if you would like to chat with me directly. Links and discounts to my favorite things and of course come on over, join our Facebook group, it's free and we'd love to have you are all down in that description box. So let's talk about my week, my weigh in and the WW workshop topic. I hope you had the best week. My week was very stressful. If you follow me over on Instagram or if you're in my Facebook group, you know that I've been updating you pretty regularly on Lola My Dog. I also did quite a big update in Wednesdays, what I eat in a day. If you missed that video, I will link it down below for you but we got some unfortunate news about Lola at the vet this last week and then it's been a whirlwind trying to figure out the next steps for her and where we go moving forward with her. So again, I'll link Wednesday's video down below. If you missed it, I really go into detail about the diagnosis and what we're doing moving forward. So it's been a pretty stressful. We actually, last week and this week has been pretty stressful and there were a lot of things going on. I went to a Gallentine's dinner with my boot camp group this last week. It was super bull. There were a couple of days of indulging a little bit more than normal. I don't like to say cheat day or cheat meal because it's not a cheat. If you have to have a cheat day or cheat meal, you're not following the right program. I like to call it over indulging just a little bit. Now of course I didn't go crazy or off the rails. I tracked everything but I went over my calories a little bit but I did meet my protein goal every day regardless which is a huge win and because I didn't go off the rails that's a big win compared to what I would have done in the past. I didn't stress eat or emotional eat which is another huge win for me and I think that all comes from and stems from my healed relationship with food which is something you know I've been working on for well over a year. I was able to get in all my workouts which honestly was quite the stress reliever for me that really helped take my mind off of things at least for the hour, hour and a half of my workout and moving my body and getting those positive endorphins flowing definitely helps in times of stress. So it's just been a rough week. It's been a rough couple of weeks and it's going to continue to be a little rough for us but we're making it through and we are definitely thinking positively so if you can send some good vibes in some prayers Lola's way that would mean a lot to us. Before we talk about this week's weigh-in though I want to chat about this week's WW workshop topic because it speaks right to my heart and that is a snack your way to weight loss success. I'm a snacker. I eat between six and seven meals a day. It's really important to me to eat about every two to three hours to fuel my body, fuel my metabolism and then I never want to enter a meal ravenously hungry like I want to eat my arm because that's when I don't make the best food choices and I overdo it. So I'd rather just make sure that I'm eating regularly throughout the day which includes a lot of snacks. Picture this, it's 3 p.m. and your stomach is rumbling. You look at your watch and you're doing the math figuring out when it's time for dinner. What do you reach for? You're hungry, it's 3 p.m. and there's two, three, four hours before dinner. You need to make sure that you set yourself up to reach for healthy snacks but make sure that you're eating a snack between meals again not to make it to dinner ravenously hungry. There's actually three decisions that you can make in this time of need and let's talk about those. The first decision is when you're going to snack. Aim to eat every three to four hours max. What you'll eat. Para-high protein, low point food with some produce whether that's fruits or vegetables. How will you make it happen? Write a grocery list and plan to shop and prep your snack stash. It is so important to have healthy snacks on hand. That way when you're hungry you're not going to the vending machine at work. You're not stopping at the driver of a gas station. You have a healthy snack on hand. I always say that I have snacks everywhere. I have snacks in my car, snacks in my purse, lots of options in my house. That way I can choose a healthy snack when that hunger hits. We even have some great snack inspiration from WWU starting with this one. Take plain non-fat Greek yogurt and add fresh or frozen fruit or you can do a hard boiled egg with some sliced bell peppers. Hummus with some fresh veggie chips. There's a lot of snack options out there. There's pre-made snacks like beef jerky, meat sticks, cheese sticks and then there's snacks that you can prepare ahead of time like the hard boiled eggs and have those in your fridge ready to go. My huge suggestion for you is whatever snack you're having make sure there's some protein. That's what's going to keep you full and satisfied until your next snack or meal and then pair it with your favorite fat source or your favorite carbohydrate. It's always best to pair macros together. Macros are protein, fats and carbs. One, two, three, two or three macros together is ideal. You should generally be able to get protein, carbs and fats and meals and then snacks you should be able to get two of the macronutrients in a snack. Going back to the hard boiled egg and bell pepper that's a source of protein, fats and you're getting some fiber and some carbs from the bell peppers. So really structure all of your snacks and meals around protein. Choosing nutritious meals, eating the right foods that's what's going to help you from being super hungry from meal to meal. And of course incorporating some healthy snacks is really going to help as well. If you don't plan ahead, this is where we can get into trouble. Like I said, this is where we're stopping at the drive-thru, the gas station Starbucks or our local convenience store and picking up maybe not the healthiest snack. All you have to do is plan and prep. Make sure you're adding healthy snacks to your grocery cart and bringing them into your home and then strategically placing them throughout the day. When I had a nine to five job I always had a snack drawer that had healthy snacks in it. So whenever I was hungry I just reached into my drawer and picked out a healthy snack and that just helped me make better choices. 91% of people that follow Weight Watchers have healthy snacks on hand. That's a huge number. That means 91% of people on a weight loss journey know how important it is to plan ahead and prep a little bit and have healthy snacks on hand. Not only does it help you make good food choices but it simplifies things. Weight loss can be a part-time job, right? Planning, prepping, tracking. It can be a part-time job. So if you make sure that you have healthy snacks on hand you can just reach for those, eat them, track them and move on and it just simplifies your weight loss overall. And I don't know about you but simplifying something in my life is huge. Lastly, I wanna share three fast facts with you. Number one, having snacks between meals can help you stay satisfied. Number two, this is especially true when they're full of protein and produce again fruits and vegetables. Number three, planning snacks ahead of time helps prevent in the moment decisions when hunger strikes. This topic relevant to everybody. I don't know a single person who doesn't have at least a snack every day and I think that this topic really helps us make better choices when it comes to choosing our snacks. Let us know down in the comments what are some of your favorite go-to snack items. I don't know about you but I could always use some extra ideas. Now let's go ahead and jump into this week's weigh-in. Like I said, it's been quite the week. It's actually been quite the couple of weeks. It's been stressful, it's been extremely emotional. There's been a few indulgences along the way. I am proud of myself for continuing with regular exercise that kinda counteracts some of those indulgences but as we know, we cannot out exercise a bad diet. We need to make sure that our diet and nutrition is on point for weight loss but I'm really, really happy to report that when I stepped on the scale, I maintained my weight. I am exactly the same weight to the ounce. I will go ahead and put my weight here on the screen for you as well as how much I've lost overall. If you missed my video this last Sunday, my huge life update, I actually shared how much I weigh because I wanted you to see that the scale, it doesn't matter. The scale is the least of your concerns on a health and wellness journey so I am going to start sharing my weight as well as my total weight loss in these Friday weigh-ins and then of course, keep you posted on where my weight goes and once I reach my weight loss goals. If you missed my huge update, highly recommend I will link that video down below for you as well. We talk about goal weight, WW plastic surgery, my body scan, it's full of updates so I'll make sure that's linked for you. So I feel really good about a maintenance. Maybe my weight loss is over. Is my weight loss over? I mean, we'll have to see what the next few weeks bring but like I always say, I'm close to my goal weight and it's just figuring out if this is where my body is happy and honestly, if this is where my body is happy, I'm happy as well. I do have a couple of goals like I mentioned in that update video in store over the net in mind over the next few months but we'll see what happens. I feel really good where I am and I'm always, always, always proud of a maintenance, especially during stressful times and stressful weeks and emotional weeks. Maintaining my weight is always a huge win. So let me know down in the comments, how was your week? Did you gain? Did you lose? And of course, leave your snack ideas down below for us and if you enjoyed today's video, give it a big thumbs up. Again, subscribe if you're not because I do away in every Friday and I upload five videos a week so make sure your bell notification is turned on. Check out the description box for nutrition coaching, links and discounts to my favorite things and don't forget, come join our Facebook group. This is how you can keep up with me day to day and we would love to have you be part of that community. Happy Friday, friends. I hope you have an amazing, amazing day and I'll see you in tomorrow's grocery haul. Bye.