 Hey guys, it's Monica. This is a collaboration video about diets and the title is actually going to be keto low carb after 50. Beating the weight gain game. You know, can you really beat the weight gain game? Our bodies change as we age. Can we really succeed at this? So yeah, a lot of good questions in this and I'm going to be honest with you and talk to you about the struggles I've had and I continue to have it. If you're looking for a happy after happy ending, a huge wonderful success story, it's not here, not yet, not for me, but maybe for some of the other ladies that are going to join me in this collab. So let me briefly introduce them to you then we'll get right to the questions. Natalie the beauty diva needs no introduction, but if you've been watching Natalie, you probably have noticed that she's her face changed. She has obviously visibly lost weight. I don't know how much she's lost, but I do know that she is on a keto or maybe low carb or a combination of both type of a program. So I'm going to be really curious to hear her story and I'm going to definitely link her video below. The other lady is Marlene Fabanglam and if you don't know who Marlene is, you need to definitely check her out. I'm sure you do. She has the most amazingly gorgeous purple hair. She is like one heck of a vibrant sexy woman and even though her channel says Fabanglam after 50, she's after 60 now. The third person, this is Marjorie. Marjorie should actually be called the keto diva, but her channel is actually keto and coffee with Marjorie. And Marjorie is a pure keto fanatic. I believe that she follows the ketogenic program to the tee. She works her macro. She does her blood test. She does everything. She's a pure keto person. I am going to really be curious to hear what Marjorie says, what Marlene says, because Marlene is obviously lost weight and what Natalie has said. They're going to share with you their journey, their successes, their, the whole nine yards. I'm going to answer these test questions. Test questions. I'm going to answer these questions. I'm going to try to answer them all. Some I may just skim over, but the first one is how old are you? How much have you lost and over what time frame and how long did it take? So I'm 64. No secret about that. I have lost over 60 pounds over a three to four year period. I've had ups and downs. It hasn't been easy. I've had some successes and I've had some failures and I've had some health issues as we, as I've traveled through my, my diet journey. So question number two, out of all the diets out there, low calorie way watches, why did you choose a keto or a low carb program? For me, the answer is pretty simple. I had tried every diet out there. I have always been a big girl. I've never been thin. My sister is tiny. She's thin. I've never been like that. So I've always been big boned. I'm five, six. You know, I'm, I'm a big boned. And so I've always had weight issues and I've always been a yo-yo dieter. So many, many, many years ago, I don't even know how long ago it was, I lost a lot of weight following the Atkins diet program when Atkins was all the rage. And then I fell off of that and gained it back and gained more back. And then I did weight watchers. I did, I tried to do weight watches, the point system that failed. And then I did the gym system. I went to the gym seven days a week, spin class, body pump, all of that in that field. So, and then when I was president of the New Hampshire Association of Realtors in 2010, and I was just so totally disgusted with myself. I was giving speeches. I was addressing our members. There are videos of me as president addressing our members. And I kept looking and I'm like, oh, so in 2010, I said, I've got to do something. And I started a diet program. I did really well for a few months. I fell off. I gained it back. I gained more back. So from 2010 to about 2015, I was up and down and up and down like crazy. I mean, a total yo-yo. And finally, I did some research and I said, I've got to really get on a good diet program. And at the time when I was researching at Keto, it wasn't sort of like in everyone's vocabulary. In fact, when I started Keto, people will go on Keto. People haven't heard of Keto. So it wasn't like a popular diet, you know, like it is now. So I did research on Keto and I said, okay, I'm going to do this, but I found Keto to be very hard for me because I did it the right way. I was a pure, I wanted to do the pure Keto way macros, counting your macros, eating your ratios of fat, protein and carbs right to your macros. That meant no processed food. That meant I couldn't buy snacks. You know, everything had to be natural. I couldn't eat Atkins bars, but I gave it a shot. I gave it my best shot and I did really well. I lost a lot of weight. I think I lost like about 50 pounds. And then I got sick. I got sick. I was sick for a whole year. I'm diagnosed. And I ended up losing my gallbladder and I lost my last 10 pounds during the time frame that it was really super, super sick. So I had emergency surgery, lost my gallbladder, which I'm not necessarily going to say is related to the diet, but most times when you have gallbladder issues, it is related to your diet. So anyways, I lost my gallbladder. I ended up getting having a loved ectomy, which I know had nothing to do with my diet. But the last year that I was really good Keto, I was very, very sick and I looked it. So that brought me to the 60 pound mark and then I stopped. So question number three, are you still doing Keto low carb? I am definitely still doing low carb. I live a low carb lifestyle. I have lived a low carb lifestyle. We have no bread. We have no potatoes. We have no rice. We have no pasta. All over the things that you normally associate with carbohydrates, we don't have in our house. So I lead a low carb lifestyle, but I am not doing Keto. I don't count my macros. I eat more higher carbs than ever before because one of the things that I've done is when I fell off the Keto wagon, I found myself gaining eight pounds back in between 2016 and summer of 2017. I gained eight pounds and I was pretty disgusted with myself. During the time frame, my job changed. I went from working part-time to working full-time for the company in that, which meant that I didn't have any time for the gym. I was also still working real estate. So I was doing full-time teaching in real estate and then doing real estate sales. So I found myself working a lot in no gym time, but I gained eight pounds. Try as a might. I'd stay on low carb. I'd stay on Keto. I'd fall back off. I could not successfully reboot myself for the life of me. And in 2018, that eight pounds turned to 14 pounds. So in summer of 2018, I said, I have got to do something. During that spring, I kept trying to reboot. I couldn't. It's very, very hard to reboot. It's very, very hard to get back on the wagon once you've fallen. It's very hard to find your motivation once you've lost it. So part of it is menopause. You think that diets, and that was question number four, are diets affected by menopause? Absolutely. There's no way in menopause that you can lose the weight as easy as you could before. And even my thin friends that have never had weight issues at all all of a sudden found themselves having bellies when they hit menopause. So they would, they would have these big middles when they hit menopause. Like I always said, well, I guess I'm kind of glad that I was fat all over instead of being thin and now all of a sudden looking like I've got six months of baby in me or something. But menopause definitely is a big, big impact for sure. Number five, how did you feel on keto? Keto, pure keto. To me, I loved it when I was on it, but it was just too restrictive for me to maintain. Modified low carb was beautiful because modified low carb meant I could have Atkins bars. I could have those cheats. You can't have an Atkins bar and say you're on keto. It's not keto approved. You can't be eating things you buy in the store and say you're on keto. In reality, the pure keto, if you read up on it, now it's all completely different. So I did feel better low carb living for sure. I mean, every time I eat a carbohydrate, I would feel whatever. Getting back to summer, this past summer, and I was looking at 14 pounds weight gain and I could see it in my face. I could see it in my stomach. I could see it in my clothes. I didn't go up a size, but everything was tighter. You know what I mean? You know, like you stand in there and you zip your pants up and you go, you're seeing a belly, you know, you're wearing, and I always wear baggy tops. When your big loose baggy tops start to feel a little more snug, you know, around your waist and around your hips and all that. There's only so much fooling yourself you can do, I think. I love being low carb, but I just could not reboot purely low carb. So the biggest and hardest part of that any diet program, and that's question number six, is once you fall, getting back on. So I did a lot of research and I knew that I probably could not successfully with my lifestyle maintain a pure keto diet. I also knew that I could not probably do low carb because I think with my lifestyle that I was not going to the gym now. I was not working out every day. I had to address my caloric intake. I had to look at how much I was consuming based on how much I was burning off. I have an apple watch and before I had an apple watch I had Fitbit. I love, I love having a tracker. It does help you stay on track. And that was an eye-opening thing when I started to look at it and saying, wow, I ate all of this, but I only burned this much. So I knew that I needed to reboot my metabolism somehow. And so I did more research and I am, and there was a couple of women I work with that had been for years on something called isogenic, which I kind of poo-hooed when they talk about it poo-hoo, you know, because it's a multi-level marketing. I'm not going to pay to have a meal replacement, blah, blah, blah. So all of a sudden I sort of went back to one of the ladies and I said, can you tell me more about this program? She'd been on it like for three years. She lost all her weight. She didn't look sick. She looked good. She had a vibrancy to her skin. She had, she just really looked good. So she said, yeah, so she says it is expensive. One can of this isogenic is, and it's a pure 100 percent meal replacement. So it isn't just a protein supplement, 100 percent meal replacement. So stop thinking about how much it's costing you $39 for a can and think about that's 14 meals. And if you do the program the way you are supposed to do it, that's your food. So for me, for weight loss, two meal replacements a day, and then one fork and knife meal at night, or you could have it in the morning or in the afternoon depending on your schedule, one fork and knife meal a day, calories about 600, depending on how active you are. So I said, well, you know, and then this cleanse days, you do two cleanse days a month, I'm like, I don't know. I don't know. But I was desperate. And so I said, I will, I'll do the 30 days. I bought the additional, the initial 30 day plan. And I said, I'm gonna give it three months. So I started at the end of June, and I do this in conjunction with my low carb lifestyle. So I have the meal replacement. It's about 240 calories. And normally we'll make it to some ice cubes. Sometimes I take some frozen blueberries and put them in there. And the meal replacement itself is about 24 carbohydrates. There's eight grams of fiber, there's some sugar in there. So when you subtract everything out and you look at, you know, your net carbs and all of that stuff, it's still relatively low carb. And you will also relatively decent calories. So each meal replacement was like 245 calories. It made sense to me. So I did that. We went away. I packed my meal replacements. I was really good. Came home from vacation. I lost weight. I was like, wow. And I drank, if you saw some of the videos and clips that I did, I drank, I had ice cream. We ate out. And I lost weight. So that was really an eye opener thing. So question number eight, what food do you eat? I just answered that. Right now, currently, I'm doing two meal, complete meal replacements. And then two hours later, you're supposed to have a snack. Your snack is supposed to be around 100 calories. You can have a little bit more if you want. Most of the time my snack is a hot boiled egg in a little container with some mustard. Sometimes it's celery sticks. Sometimes it's peppers. Most of the time it's a vegetable. Sometimes it's yogurt. Sometimes it's a slice of a couple of cheese. Whatever it is that comes out to be 100 calories. So I have that. Two hours after I have that, I have my second meal replacement. I make this up in the morning. I make my two shakes, two snacks for the day. And I put it in a little thing. And I drink a ton, a ton of water. So to me, it works. And alcohol. I've gone out. I've had alcohol. I'm not a huge big drinker. I was in my younger years, but I'm not anymore. So alcohol isn't a really big, big issue for me. But if I do drink, I try to stick to a low carb, low sugar drink, if at all possible. Although I love a margarita and I love strawberry dichery. So I will indulge in that as well. I won't deny myself. So question number nine, what motivates you the most? Every day I wake up. I stop my motivation. I say to myself, you woke up. Everyone around you that you love has woken up. You have another day to make a difference. You have another day to make a good decision. You have another day to take a step in the right direction. Thank you, Lord, for giving me that day. So every day, when I wake up, it may sound corny, but I am highly motivated. Every night before I go to bed, I try to think of three things that I did that happened to me that people that I love that were good, that were positive. So I try to go to bed at night with positive reinforcement. And I think that's really, really huge. I also find motivation from people around me. I've joined, you know, like when it did isogenics, I joined a couple of isogenic groups, so to their recipes. When I was pure keto, I joined pure keto groups. When it was pure keto, one of the things that I found out about was the fact that a lot of times there were women had reported hair loss and I was like, oh, holy crap, I don't want to lose my hair. So one of the things that they were suggesting on the keto boards at that time was to make sure you got a really good, good, good collagen supplement and you took good supplements and they had their recommendations of supplements. And one of the things they talked about was the collagen. And they said, make sure the collagen you get is not mixed with a bunch of crowd and fillers and this and that. You want pure, as pure as you can get, good, good collagen. And that's how we actually found the Great Lakes Collagen at that time because it was recommended heavily in the keto boards that it was in as the collagen of choice for in keto approved diet. And so we started to really use it. The other thing is MCT oil, get a really good, you know, type of a fat MCT oil without a whole bunch of stuff in there is excellent, as well as Kerry Gold butter. I still, that's my butter of choice. These are the type of things that I did to find out in those groups and in the support system groups is you're not always going to be successful. You're going to have your failures without a doubt and give yourself permission to not always make it every day. It'd be a good keto day or a good low carb day or a good diet day. You know, give yourself permission to have a cheat and just plan those cheat as much as possible. I think if you plan a cheat, I'm going out to dinner tonight. We're going to this restaurant. I know I love their onion rings. I'm going to have their onion rings. I'm going to plan that. It makes it very, very different than when you're, you know, walking by a place and you see a sign and you go, I've got to go in there and have an onion ring or something of that nature. Support system is really, really huge. And I think if you surround yourself with people that are in the same kind of a frame, it doesn't matter what diet because, you know, quite truthfully any diet you start today is going to make a difference on you because anytime you do something different to your body, your body reacts and it's usually with some initial weight loss. So surround yourself with people that are in the same frame of mind as you because you can get motivated from other people around you. Number 11, do you have more to lose and you plan on staying on your current diet lifestyle? I do have more to lose and, you know, it becomes that choice between your skin, your face and your bum, your body. Skin isn't firm, you know. So do I want to have like, you know, skin cheeks and look really sick and have a good body? I don't know. It becomes that decision. I don't want to age my face for the sake of my butt, but I also want to be healthier and I think that I'm healthier at a lower weight than at a heavier weight. So yes, I do have more to lose. I just, my main, main, main goal is to not gain weight is to, I was, I'm so happy that I broke the cycle because I broke it at 14 pounds. Can you imagine if I didn't break that cycle, I could probably be sitting here saying, well, I'm now 20 pounds or 22 pounds, you know what I mean? So I broke the cycle and for me, that's, that's, that's good because I really struggled with that. Recognizing I needed to refine my motivation. I needed to reboot my diet and I needed to be successful was important to me. So yeah, I have some to lose. I'm going to monitor it very carefully. I just don't want to gain. So your number 12, what is your secret weapon? What advice would you give your best friend if you're starting this path? I would tell her to carefully check your diet. I think low carb living is, is probably the most successful ultimate diet anyone can be on. Big secret weapon for me is to drink a ton of water. Make sure you get your vitamins. Make sure you're physically checked. Drink a ton, a ton, a ton of water. If you're a woman, even if you're a man, get on a collagen bandwagon, whatever. Get yourself a good protein supplement. If you don't like to eat a lot of meat, get yourself a good solid protein supplement. This is a meal replacement. So if you were just having regular meals and you just wanted to drink some protein, this would probably be too high calories for you. But there are protein supplements that you know, have you can just drink 40 grams of protein and be done with it without all the other stuff. Just accept who you are and recognize that every little step you take brings you in the right direction. Don't listen to the naysayers. Don't listen to the people that sabotage you. Don't listen to people that want to throw torpedoes at you. You're never going to please everyone and in your heart it's you, you have to live with and you have to find acceptance of yourself and you have to be honest with yourself. You have to look at yourself in the mirror and be totally honest with yourself. Get on the scale, monitor it. Don't be afraid. Monitor it and say, okay, here's what it is. And be honest with yourself and here's what I'm going to do. And don't let the naysayers or the people that are going to torpedo you. Don't let them in your brain. Don't let them in. Keep that door closed. It's important that you find yourself and it's important that you do it for you. You can't do it for anyone else. You really can't. It's got to be for you and I'm sure you can do it. I'm sure you can do it. We're on this journey together and I just hope, and I've said this to a few friends, if you see me fall, speak up. Help me. Help me. Even if I'm too embarrassed to say help me. Help me. We all need help and nobody wants to fail and it's embarrassing when you fail. So yeah, speak up. Let's help each other. So I'm really, really excited to watch the videos that Natalie and Marlene and Marjorie, their diet videos, their journey, I'm sure it's going to be a little bit different than mine. But you know, more importantly, we're supporting each other. We really are in many, many ways. We're supporting each other. We're all women. We're all mature and we're all struggling with our fitness, with our health and in some cases with our skin as well. And we have to find that wonderful balance. We have to find ourselves in this journey and we have to be true to ourselves. So with that said, I know this is super long. I'm going to link everyone below. I totally appreciate you watching. If you have any questions, any keto questions, any diet questions, low carb questions, please let me know. I'll do my best to answer. To me, low carb living is the best way for me and I'm just coupling it with a good, healthy meal replacement. And that seems to have kickstarted me. And that makes me happy. It really does. Bye guys.