How to Get Toned in Your 40s by Eating More Food

Karen: I immediately started losing weight and toning more.

Nikkiey: Wait, by eating more food?

Karen: By eating more food, yeah.

Nikkiey: Hey, so today I have WarriorBabe Karen here with us. Before she found WarriorBabe, Karen spent years trying to stay fit. She was balancing her career. She was raising two teenagers. And she was doing everything for everyone else. But when constant migraines and exhaustion and creeping weight gain started to take over, she realized something had to change. She wanted to be strong. She wanted to feel energized. And she wanted to be in control, not just now, but for the long game. And then she found WarriorBabe. That gave her structured workouts, guidance, and the confidence to get her health back. And now she's thriving in ways that she never imagined. Today I have her here to share her story with us. Karen, welcome.

Karen: Thank you.

Nikkiey: So can you let the listeners know where you are from, what you do for work, and how old you are?

Karen: All right. So I live just outside of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I'm a principal engineer and a technical project manager for a small tech company that designs sensors. So it's go, go, go at work.

Nikkiey: Yeah.

Karen: And I have two kids who are now teenagers. Balancing all of that is pretty hard.

Nikkiey: Yeah. And how old are you?

Karen: Oh, sorry. I'm 47 now.

Nikkiey: Okay, cool. And fellow PA resident. Let's go. I'm from outside of Philadelphia. Pittsburgh is such a beautiful city.

Karen: Yeah.

Nikkiey: Okay, so let's dive into your story before WarriorBabe. What was your health and fitness like before you joined us?

Karen: My entire life I've been active. I love the outdoors. I do things. And I remember when I was younger thinking, I like to bike, I like to kayak, I like to hike, I don't need a workout. Right? And that gets you by in your 20s, kind of in your 30s. But I had my kids. Life got a lot busier. And the pandemic happened, and with little kids, that was crazy. After that, I had some health issues, and my weight just started creeping up. I remember my mom's weight starting to creep up when she was about the same age. And I was like, I don't want that to happen to me. I have plans for retirement. I want to be active. I want to do things. And it just really wasn't working.

So I started trying to figure out how to work out. There's a million and five different ways and tips and tricks and so on, but it wasn't really working. Every year my weight would creep up a little bit more. And I was doing things that didn't feel very effective, and it's hard to stick with things that aren't effective. So I felt like I was putting in effort with no result. I was getting pretty frustrated with that.

Nikkiey: Sure. Because you said you were always active and doing all the things, was there one specific thing that you felt was still missing?

Karen: Yeah. So I like going biking, for example. We've got this beautiful rails-to-trails trail near our house, and I have kind of this route I like riding. And it felt like if I ride my bike several times a week, it should get easier at some point. And it never did. I'm like, man, this hill is still hard. I wasn't getting any better. In that sense, I was getting less fit because I was getting older and not really doing anything about it. It felt like I was going through the motions of something and there was no result. And I just can't keep doing that.

Nikkiey: I hear you. You're putting in all of the work, all this effort, and it's not showing the results that you want. What was the most frustrating part about that?

Karen: It felt like I had to put in time that was already scarce. I'm doing things and I have to keep making time for something, and then it feels like, why am I doing this? Every year my weight went up a little bit. I'd be like, oh, I'll lose it over the summer. And that never happened. So I think it was seeing that cycle.

And then, like you mentioned, I got some really bad migraines. I was sick. I had sleep issues. I was just a zombie for a while. And I realized I can't keep doing what I'm doing. I have to invest in myself if I want to see results.

Nikkiey: Love that. Was there a specific moment that really hit you that you needed to make a change?

Karen: Yeah, I think it was towards the tail end of that. I finally got some sleep medication and some resolution for those issues. But I realized that everybody's expectations of me never changed, whether I was healthy or not. And if I didn't make that space for myself, it was never going to be about myself.

Nikkiey: Wow.

Karen: Work would be taking all that time and my family would take all that time, and there'd be none left for me.

Nikkiey: Wow. You mentioned when I was reading through your form that you would put everyone ahead of you, right?

Karen: Yeah.

Nikkiey: Was that the moment that made you realize you had to make a change?

Karen: Yeah, yeah. It was that realization that if I put everyone first, they would accept that and take all that time from me, and there'd be none left for me. And nobody was making that space to say, hey, you need time for yourself.

Nikkiey: Wow. That's serious self-awareness. The expectations you just mentioned, you need to fulfill those for yourself, not for everyone else around you. How did these struggles impact your motivation, your confidence, your relationships?

Karen: It made me feel like I didn't have a lot of control. If you feel like you have no control over yourself and the things you want to get done, I think that spirals into all parts of your life, where you feel like someone else is steering where you're going. And that's hard. I realized I'd let that happen and I needed to start steering myself.

Nikkiey: I love that for you. That's a big realization. When you first started WarriorBabe, did you have any fears or doubts about whether it would actually work?

Karen: Yeah. I signed up for WarriorBabe because I saw all the ads everywhere on social media about this one quick fix: if only you eat this one thing, everything will be fixed. And I knew that wasn't true. So what really attracted me to WarriorBabe was that it made sense. It was a multitude of things. I know diet matters. I know exercise matters. It was putting it together. But it was overwhelming at first. I remember getting that first, here's the macros you need to hit, and being like, how am I ever going to do this?

Nikkiey: Let's actually backtrack on that really quick. Sorry, Karen. Did you know anything about macros beforehand?

Karen: I'd heard about them, but I didn't really know anything about them.

Nikkiey: Yeah. What was your focus like when it came to nutrition before WarriorBabe?

Karen: I knew things like keto seemed to work because they restrict what you can eat. One realization I had was that if I did some type of diet that essentially prevented me from picking up random junk food because it didn't fit the restrictions I had set for myself, that would help. But sometimes I lost some weight, and I certainly wasn't more fit or anything like that. So I hadn't been into macros at all. And right about the time I saw the ads for WarriorBabe is when I was like, huh, maybe there's something to this.

Nikkiey: Okay. And when you saw the WarriorBabe ads, was it me in the ads?

Karen: Yes.

Nikkiey: What specifically stuck out about what I was talking about?

Karen: It was the combination of everything. It wasn't just, here's one thing you need to do. And it spoke to me because I knew I wanted to lose weight, but it wasn't about losing weight as much as being fit and knowing that I would remain fit. And the idea that this is a lifestyle. I can't do a diet where after three months I'm like, oh my God, I can't wait to be off this diet and eat cake again. I knew I needed a lifestyle. So the combination of, hey, it's a lifestyle, and here are the things, and then seeing all the other support. It's not just food. It's not just workouts. It's the whole mindset and how you bring that into your life. That really spoke to me. And I have to say, it is real.

Nikkiey: I love that. So we measured up on the promises?

Karen: Yes. Absolutely.

Nikkiey: Good. I love that. You mentioned it was overwhelming at the beginning. Let's talk about that. What were your initial thoughts in the first couple of months when you started working with your coach?

Karen: At first it was, let's see what I'm eating. And then that first week she's like, here's the macros and here's a suggested meal plan. It was a lot of ideas, but it was also overwhelming. I remember sitting there that Sunday, I'd come back from a weekend away, and I was like, how am I ever going to make this happen? And then I also realized I was hungry, and I should not be making decisions while I'm hungry. So have a good dinner.

That first week I was like, I have to cut this down. I have to make this manageable. There's a bunch of suggestions here, but I'm going to pick out four meals that look good to me, start with that, and start building chunks. Now, I love math. That's part of my job. So I quickly realized macros is a game where you balance numbers. Once I was into macros, it made so much sense, because it's just figuring out how all these blocks fit together and making that balance. But the beginning was a lot.

Nikkiey: I love the way you just painted that picture, because that's exactly what it is. It's a balance of numbers across the four or five meals you have in the day. And that can serve you in so many ways, and we'll get to talking about how that's helped you. That's a great outlook on it. I always used to call it the game of Tetris, where I had to get the blocks to the top, the five plus or minus.

You mentioned in the form for this interview that WarriorBabe took out the guesswork of your workouts and your nutrition. How did that change your experience compared to what you were doing beforehand?

Karen: Beforehand, I found some exercise videos that had a routine put together, and I was doing those. But I also always got distracted by someone saying, hey, here's this really effective workout you should do. So I was piecing things together, which wasn't very effective. And I didn't really have time to figure it out myself. I think that's the biggest thing: I don't have to figure it out when I have a coach, because she knows and she adjusts as needed and she has all that knowledge. I don't have to become a coach, because I already have a job.

Nikkiey: I love that. Can you unpack that a little more? How has working with your coach changed your approach to fitness and nutrition, and even how you balance your professional life with your workouts and nutrition?

Karen: For the food, I've figured out go-tos. So when it's really busy, I don't have to overthink food. There's always that backup plan. And if there are days I want to bake, I can figure that out if I want, but I don't have to. I like that about macros. There's math involved, but I know what I'm going for, and it's really easy. I have chocolate almost every day, because life is sad without chocolate.

Nikkiey: Yes.

Karen: But I know I can fit it in, and I know what's a reasonable amount. It takes the guesswork out of it. And the workouts are the same way. I give feedback to my coach if there's any exercise I'm struggling with or I have questions, and I get feedback. But having that set, this is what we're going to do, means I don't have to think about it. I don't have to wonder which combo of things I should be doing or how I should be putting that together. It's really nice to have that and know it's tailored to me. I didn't just pull it off the internet somewhere and hope it works.

Nikkiey: Oh, I love the ease of that for you now. Going back a little to macros, you mentioned there's a learning curve at the beginning, and then you made it work for you with the math, breaking it down and picking out four meals. How much time did it take you to log those meals at the beginning, and how much time is it taking you now?

Karen: At the beginning, I would sit down on Sundays and be like, all right, what am I prepping this week and how is it going to work? Oh, I want to eat this. Oh, that's going to throw everything off. Let me rethink my dinner. I would definitely spend a lot of time on Sunday figuring out what I needed to prep and how it was going to work.

And then I got to the point where I was like, okay, these are things I really like eating, and I basically build my meals. Then there's a little fudge factor around it where I haven't quite hit all my macros yet, and I can fit things in there. I have a few things at night where I know, here's how I can add a little more protein, here's how I can add a little more carbs. I finally got to the point where adding a little more fat sometimes has to happen. I did not think I was going to get there. Fat used to be the thing I was always trying to figure out how not to exceed. But I'm at that point now.

So it's become so much easier. There are just some go-to meals. This is what I have for lunch, so I don't have to think about it, because I've basically built these larger Tetris blocks. When I was starting out, there were all these small little blocks and I was trying to balance like 40 of them. Now I'm like, okay, this is a prebuilt meal and I plug it in here. And that's made it easier.

Nikkiey: That's amazing. I love that.

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So with all the things you tried before WarriorBabe, and now that you're five months into the program, what made WarriorBabe different from everything you've tried before?

Karen: Partially it's comprehensive. And partially, a lot of the things I tried before were a lot of cardio. I still have friends who are like, I'm going to hit the gym and run 20 miles every day this week because it's Thanksgiving. And I'm like, yeah, that never worked for me. And it was a time sink. I think that was a lot of it. And then there were other things. Like I said, I tried keto at one point. I definitely lost some weight, but there was no way I was sticking with that long term. That made it really hard, because you're depriving yourself of things you like. So yeah, you can get some type of results for a while, but it's not a lifestyle.

Nikkiey: Yeah. Who wants to not have carbs?

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For the rest of their life? Right. It's not sustainable. You wouldn't be able to have that chocolate at the end of the day.

Okay. You mentioned that your goal is to grow old and feel strong and be active. How has WarriorBabe helped you feel like that's possible?

Karen: I think the biggest thing I've gotten from WarriorBabe is actually confidence. It's the confidence that I can control my body. I can control my life. I can control other things. For example, I work out in the mornings now. I never thought I would do that, because you have to get up really early. But I found that as hard as it is to get up in the morning and do a workout, it sets me up for success for the rest of the day. I get through that workout and I'm like, I did 12 reps today. That was a success. And I walk into work and I'm like, look at the success I've already had today. I can do this.

So I think that's the big thing: that confidence that I can achieve goals, looking at those small wins every day and building off of that. That gives me the confidence that, yeah, it's a lifestyle. And when I retire, I can travel the world and carry my own suitcase. That seems so achievable when I look at all these little successes.

Nikkiey: I love that for you. That's such a powerful perspective. That confidence is what you've gained the most, and you work out in the morning now. It really is the hardest thing to do first thing in the morning, and when you go into work, everything else is a breeze.

Karen: Right, right. I've told other people, it's a step at a time. My alarm goes off and I'm like, okay, maybe I won't work out today because I don't feel like it, but I'm going to get out of bed. And then I get out of bed and I'm like, well, I'm up, so I'm going to eat. So I eat my pre-workout food, and then I'm like, oh, this workout isn't really that hard, I think I can do it. So I live life in these little steps, in a sense, so it never feels overwhelming. I think I approached all of it this way. The macros, the workouts, getting things done, I just break it down that way.

Nikkiey: I love that. You just inspired me, because I started doing morning workouts and it's really hard to wake up in the morning. We're taking Karen steps. I like that.

Karen: It is so hard, and it's ridiculous because I feel so good afterwards. But every morning my brain forgets, and it's like, this is the worst thing ever.

Nikkiey: Isn't it wild how our brains work like that? Okay, so let's talk about since joining WarriorBabe. Actually, let's start at the beginning. Did you start in a cut? Did you start in a retrain?

Karen: I started in retrain, but I immediately started losing weight and toning more.

Nikkiey: Wait, by eating more food?

Karen: By eating more food. Yeah.

Nikkiey: Okay. When you were assessing how much you were eating at the beginning, what was it roughly? Do you remember?

Karen: I was in the 1,500 to 1,800 range. On a day I ate a lot, I was eating about 1,800 calories, but average days were lower, and my protein was terrible.

Nikkiey: Yeah. So it was mainly carbs and fats?

Karen: It was a lot of carbs and fats.

Nikkiey: That's totally normal, Karen. You're not alone there. A lot of women have a hard time with it. It's not that it's hard to eat. It's the understanding of it. We don't know that we need to eat protein. I wasn't taught that. Were you taught that?

Karen: I knew I had to eat protein, but the amount, no. I was like, oh, I'm having some protein, it's fine. So now I'm at a little over 2,100 calories, and I'm still losing weight and gaining muscle.

Nikkiey: That's incredible. Are you still in the retrain right now, or are you maintaining?

Karen: We're at the point where we're kind of maintaining, seeing what my body does from here on out. So the weight loss has obviously slowed down. I'm down over 20 pounds, and that's 30 pounds from what I weighed a few months before I started WarriorBabe, that spring, when I was like, I can't do this anymore, which is part of that motivation.

Nikkiey: It's amazing.

Karen: And I lost weight over winter. I don't think that's ever happened to me. Winter is usually the bulking season with all the holidays, right?

Nikkiey: That's right.

Karen: I eat so many Christmas cookies, and yet I fit them in my macros.

Nikkiey: Oh, I love to hear that. That's incredible. You should be so proud of yourself.

Karen: I am. And like I said, it's the confidence. I'm having success, and it really drives me, even outside of weight loss and fitness and things like that. It's the mindset, and I'm loving that.

Nikkiey: That's awesome. What are some more top achievements you've had with us?

Karen: Like I said, I've had to rebuild my wardrobe. I was super excited the other day. There's this skirt I love that I hadn't fit in since my daughter was born, and now I fit in it again. Those clothes you love, and you're like, it'll work out. And it did. I feel vindicated for saving some of my favorite stuff.

Also, a few weeks ago my workout shifted a little bit, and there were some things where I was like, oh, I can do this now. I'm lifting way more weight than I ever thought possible, because it seemed like I was making no progress before. So it's not so much one big win. It's all these little things I notice. One of my coworkers recently said to me as we were walking up the stairs in our building, you used to get kind of out of breath doing this, and now it's no sweat. And I'm like, yeah.

Nikkiey: What about if you were to get back on a bike again? Have you tested that out? Is it easier now?

Karen: I've done a little biking, and it's definitely a lot easier.

Nikkiey: I love that. I'm celebrating you so hard over here. You also mentioned you're lifting heavier weights than ever before. How does that make you feel?

Karen: That's a huge accomplishment, because there's a point where you buy weights, and then at some point you have to get heavier weights. I was stuck in this, okay, but I just have the little dinky weights. And now I'm like, oh, okay. So I bought 20-pound weights, and I'm going to need more. I do my workouts at home, so I'm expanding my home gym.

Nikkiey: How has that influenced other areas of your life? Your career? Your family?

Karen: Overall, being more confident has made a big difference at work, too. I manage a pretty diverse group of engineers and scientists, so I'm always juggling stuff. It's like, okay, let's go with the flow, let's figure this out, let's solve these problems, let's break it apart, let's keep going. I always had that mentality to some extent. But having that confidence, like I said, I come in the door at work in the morning and I've worked out, and I already feel like I have this win that makes things feel doable. That's different from dragging yourself into work in the morning thinking, ah, let's see what's going to happen.

Nikkiey: Totally.

Karen: So I think that's made a big difference. And my family has actually been very supportive of me making time for myself. I don't think they would have realized it without me actually doing it. My daughter's 13, so body image things come up with her. She's joined me for some workouts. So I think she's also seeing that confidence and why I'm going to make a change, and here it is. I think that's helping her as well.

Nikkiey: Karen, that's huge. That's generational, helping her see the positive light of working out and eating right, what it can do for her and how it can make her feel. When we were chatting at the beginning, you mentioned that it's not just about the pounds or the inches you've lost, but that you're feeling more energized. Can you talk a little more about that?

Karen: Like I said, there was a point where I had migraines and I couldn't sleep right. I'd sleep eight hours and still not feel rested when I woke up in the morning. I remember feeling like a zombie at the end of the day and dragging through it. Working out in the morning makes it even better in terms of energy. I was working out in the evenings when I started, because it felt like that was where the time was. But coming home with that, oh my God, I still have to work out, was really hard. The end of the day had this looming, I have to do this. Working out in the morning makes me more alert and more energetic, so I have more energy throughout the day. Obviously eating right and all these things are helping, but I think it's part of the mindset, too. And when I get home at night, I can spend time with the family and I don't have things I have to go do. Built into all of that, I'm healthier and happier, and that's all contributing to my energy, but figuring out how to set up my day has been huge for that.

Nikkiey: You're a freaking rock star, Karen. You had this self-awareness of the things that had to change. One, you took control and made the moves for yourself to do the workouts and sign up for the program, to take this into your own hands, because no one else was going to do it for you. That's huge, and you should be very proud of that. Two, you said, okay, I'm going to approach macros from this perspective because this is how my brain works and it's going to work best for me. People think, oh, this is the way Karen does it, so I have to do it the way Karen does. But you have the ability to say, hey, this is how it's going to work for me, and that's how I'm going to be successful. And the last thing I heard is that the evening workouts weren't working for you. You were aware of that looming feeling of, I still have to do this at the end of the day. It didn't make you excited. It was more like, I have to work out. Now it's, I get to work out. You shifted gears and put it at the beginning of the day, and now you're radiating with the control and the confidence you have. It's so cool to hear your story.

This is just a what-if: what if you never made the change? Where do you think you'd be today?

Karen: I think I'd be getting increasingly frustrated that I don't have control over myself. And if you don't have control over yourself, you don't feel like you have control over anything else. So I feel really lucky. I think I found WarriorBabe right when I was really open to it. And I committed to it a hundred percent, because if I was going to do this, I was going to do this.

Nikkiey: I love that you said that, because I've done about 25 other interviews with WarriorBabes, and maybe 25% of them said, I sat on it, I waited a month, I put it in a saved bucket, and I kept getting the ads and the content, and I finally made a decision. But you were like, nah, I'm open, I'm ready, this is popping up in my space at the right time. You booked the call for the next day and then you signed up.

Karen: Yeah. And then I signed up and I spent that money, and I was going to get my money's worth. It's funny, it's all those little things that provide reinforcement for what I need to get done. Yes, there's the, I spent money on it. But tracking my food is also amazing because there's accountability. I can now have a package of cookies at work and know I can only eat three today, and it's okay if the whole package is over there, because I'm going to pull out my three and set them aside. If I started eating more cookies, well, there goes the rest of my day. I can't have dinner anymore.

Nikkiey: Right.

Karen: And my coach helps, too. Knowing someone is looking. Those are things that keep me accountable and on track as well. So yeah, if I'm going to do this, I'm going to do this.

Nikkiey: I love that. What would you say to someone listening right now who's afraid to put themselves first? Think back to Karen before WarriorBabe. There are a bunch of women out there who feel that way, who are afraid to show up and put themselves first. What advice would you give that woman?

Karen: Inevitably, if you're not making space for yourself, you're not going to be able to give everything else the energy and effort and commitment it needs, because you end up running on empty. I'm more present with my daughter, spending time with her now, because I don't have all this other stuff looming in the back of my head. So by committing to myself and marking out a corner of my life for myself and my time, that lets me be more committed to the rest of the things. Balance matters, and you don't do a good job at anything if you're not balanced.

Nikkiey: I love that. Great way to start closing this out. I have one more question for you. For someone watching this right now who's unsure about taking the next step, what would you tell them about WarriorBabe and how it could impact their life?

Karen: It really is about lifestyle. It's not about addressing one corner of your life and ignoring the rest. It's about balance across my entire life, what I want to do now and what I want to do in the future. Fundamentally, it's not about weight loss. It's about being the best me, and being fit and healthy is part of that. It's that mindset of how you tackle your entire life. Like I said, the biggest thing I've gotten out of this isn't how many inches I've lost on my waist or how many pounds I've lost or how much weight I can lift. It's that confidence of having control over my life. And that's invaluable.

Nikkiey: You're incredible, Karen. That's some really wise advice, and I can't wait for a lot of women to hear those words. You need to say it louder for the ones in the back, because it's not just about weight loss. It's about how this is helping me for the long term, to have longevity, to feel confident, to feel like my best self. So then you can present yourself to the people around you, your family, your career, and the people who cross your path, as the confident version of Karen.

Karen: Yeah.

Nikkiey: Super cool to hear your story. To everyone listening, so many women can relate to Karen's story. I'm sure there are women listening who are balancing everything and everyone and putting themselves last. But when Karen finally decided to take control of her health, she found strength. She found confidence. She found control. She found the best version of herself that she never imagined possible. If you're tired of spinning your wheels and you're ready to make some real change, this is your sign. This is the opportunity to take the first step, so check out WarriorBabe.com. Karen, thank you so much for being here and sharing your story. I appreciate it.

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