#403 - Eating Less Is Why Your Body Isn't Changing After 40 with Craig McDonald

Sarah is 41, a single mum, and 17kg lighter than when she joined us 12 months ago.Before that, she'd done every diet going. Keto, shakes, very low carb. She lived on salads, almond milk and a bit of protein, and said no to potatoes every time. After a really hard few years, she hit 109kg, the biggest she'd ever been. Then one New Year's Eve photo with her daughter made her say "enough".Now her main carbs are potatoes and sourdough. She eats real butter and normal dairy. She trains with actual numbers to hit instead of guessing. Her bloating is gone, she sleeps 8 to 9 hours a night, and she's rebuilt her body with muscle, not just dropped weight.The part I love most? She hasn't been on a single coaching call. Her check-ins, her data and the women in our community got her here.In this episode she shares exactly what changed, what she'd say to anyone sitting on the fence, and why she's locking in for another 12 months.RESOURCES + LINKSMetabolic Reset ChallengeLearn more about our Winatlife Coaching optionsSaturée products use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first order.Pro-Metabolic Company use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first purchase.Drop Us A Review On The Podcast + Post a screenshot on Instagram stories and Tag @kittyblomfield for your chance to win a tub of Saturée Premium CollagenReview on SpotifyFOLLOWKitty Blomfield @kittyblomfieldCraig McDonald @iamcraigmcdonaldAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

If you're eating less than ever, training more than ever, and your body still isn't changing, this one's for you.After coaching over 18,000 women, Craig and I see the same three patterns over and over:The consistent under eater. Years on 1,200 to 1,600 calories, training hard, but not eating enough to recover and not training hard enough to build muscle.Under eating, then overeating. Strict all week, starving by the weekend. It's a fuel problem, not a willpower problem.Dieting without a base of muscle. Every diet leaves her a bit smaller and a bit softer.Calories still count. But eating less on its own won't build the body you want if there's not enough muscle underneath and not enough fuel to build it.Linda, who has Hashimoto's, was maintaining on 1,700 calories. We set her strength targets, built her up to 2,300 calories, then did a fat loss phase. She dropped 8% body fat and now maintains it eating 2,300 calories a day.In this week's episode we break down all three patterns and what to change.RESOURCES + LINKSMetabolic Reset ChallengeLearn more about our Winatlife Coaching optionsSaturée products use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first order.Pro-Metabolic Company use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first purchase.Drop Us A Review On The Podcast + Post a screenshot on Instagram stories and Tag @kittyblomfield for your chance to win a tub of Saturée Premium CollagenReview on SpotifyFOLLOWKitty Blomfield @kittyblomfieldCraig McDonald @iamcraigmcdonaldAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Yep, I know. This one's going to ruffle some feathers.I sat down with my gorgeous friend Theresa, who works with people with severe chronic illness and trauma, and she doesn't hold back.Here's what we get into:→ Why a low energy brain props itself up on stress hormones (hello, can't sit still)→ Why stimulants like coffee and ADHD meds actually CALM some people down→ The nutrient bottlenecks she sees over and over: B1, magnesium, potassium, zinc, copper and light→ How living in fear literally burns through the minerals your brain needs to make energy→ What she sees in people who've been on these meds long term→ And my own story of never being able to sit down and relax, and what was really driving itTheresa is so clear on this: the symptoms are very real. But if we only cover them up, we miss what the body is actually asking for.RESOURCES + LINKSMetabolic Reset ChallengeLearn more about our Winatlife Coaching optionsSaturée products use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first order.Pro-Metabolic Company use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first purchase.Drop Us A Review On The Podcast + Post a screenshot on Instagram stories and Tag @kittyblomfield for your chance to win a tub of Saturée Premium CollagenReview on SpotifyFOLLOWKitty Blomfield @kittyblomfieldTheresa Piela @theresapielaAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Part 2 of our deep dive with @katedeeringfitness @thenutritioncoach @jfwellness, this one's about the research they don't want you questioning.At the end of 2025, the FDA quietly removed the cardiovascular black box warning from hormone therapy. The reasoning leaned on studies from 1991 and 1996. When those same claims were tested properly in randomized controlled trials, they didn't hold up.We break down:– what the Women's Health Initiative actually found (and what it didn't)– where the "60 picogram" ideal estrogen number really comes from– why estrogen is the same hormone doctors block in breast cancer patients– whether skipping hormone therapy actually dooms your bones, heart and brainRESOURCES + LINKSMetabolic Reset ChallengeLearn more about our Winatlife Coaching optionsSaturée products use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first order.Pro-Metabolic Company use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first purchase.Drop Us A Review On The Podcast + Post a screenshot on Instagram stories and Tag @kittyblomfield for your chance to win a tub of Saturée Premium CollagenReview on SpotifyFOLLOWKitty Blomfield @kittyblomfieldCraig McDonald @iamcraigmcdonaldAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Sat down with Kate Deering, Emma Sgourakis and Jay Feldman for the deepest dive we've ever done on estrogen and it changes how you should be thinking about menopause.You've been told menopause = estrogen deficiency. Get the levels back up, symptoms go away. That's not the full story.Blood tests only measure what your ovaries are producing. After menopause your body keeps making estrogen in your fat, muscle, brain and bone and there's no test tracking that. So plenty of women being told they're "low" are actually estrogen dominant, with no one checking.We get into:– why "normal" thyroid labs can still mean you're functionally hypothyroid– the direct link between constipation and estrogen overload– what's actually happening when estrogen "fixes" your hot flashes– why in excess, estrogen behaves like a growth hormone, not an energy hormoneThis is Part 1 of 2. Part 2 (dropping next week) is about what the research actually shows on hormone therapy including what the FDA didn't tell you.RESOURCES + LINKSMetabolic Reset ChallengeLearn more about our Winatlife Coaching optionsSaturée products use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first order.Pro-Metabolic Company use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first purchase.Drop Us A Review On The Podcast + Post a screenshot on Instagram stories and Tag @kittyblomfield for your chance to win a tub of Saturée Premium CollagenReview on SpotifyFOLLOWKitty Blomfield @kittyblomfieldCraig McDonald @iamcraigmcdonaldAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Nobody is telling you this about Ozempic.1 in 5 women who come off Ozempic regain all the weight within a year. And when it comes back, it comes back about four times faster than if you'd lost it through diet and training.I sat down with Jay Feldman (he's basically a walking encyclopaedia on this stuff) to go through what these drugs are actually doing in the body. Not the marketing version. The mechanism.They don't fix your metabolism. They shut down the reward centre in your brain so food stops feeling good, the same pathway recreational drugs hit. That's why the weight comes off. It's also why 60 to 70% of people are off these drugs within a year, and why a big chunk of what's lost isn't fat, it's muscle and bone.We also got into the "food noise" conversation, and Jay makes a pretty compelling case that it's a term the drug companies invented, not a diagnosis.This isn't an anti GLP-1 rant. There's a real conversation in here about when they might actually make sense too. But the risks that don't make it into the ads deserve equal airtime.RESOURCES + LINKSMetabolic Reset ChallengeLearn more about our Winatlife Coaching optionsSaturée products use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first order.Pro-Metabolic Company use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first purchase.Drop Us A Review On The Podcast + Post a screenshot on Instagram stories and Tag @kittyblomfield for your chance to win a tub of Saturée Premium CollagenReview on SpotifyFOLLOWKitty Blomfield @kittyblomfieldCraig McDonald @iamcraigmcdonaldAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

This week's episode is one of the hardest, most honest conversations I've had on the podcast.My guest Vanessa's daughter Millie was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumour at 10 years old. The surgery saved her life but it damaged her hypothalamus, and she lost the ability to ever feel full. Within weeks she went from an emaciated 17kg to obese. Vanessa ended up putting locks on the kitchen cupboards, just to keep her daughter safe from herself.Every piece of standard nutrition advice they were given made things worse. What actually turned it around went against everything Vanessa, a qualified clinical nutritionist had ever been taught.Ten years on, Millie is 20, manages her own nutrition day to day, and Vanessa now works as a pro-metabolic nutritionist herself.This one will stay with you.RESOURCES + LINKSMetabolic Reset ChallengeLearn more about our Winatlife Coaching optionsSaturée products use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first order.Pro-Metabolic Company use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first purchase.Drop Us A Review On The Podcast + Post a screenshot on Instagram stories and Tag @kittyblomfield for your chance to win a tub of Saturée Premium CollagenReview on SpotifyFOLLOWKitty Blomfield @kittyblomfieldCraig McDonald @iamcraigmcdonaldAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Part two with @leilalutz.If you missed part part comment POD396 and I’ll DM you the link to listen to part 1.This one goes somewhere different.We get into why perimenopause has become the industry's new favourite thing to sell you. Why "you're not a unicorn, you're just under-resourced" might be the most useful sentence in this whole conversation. Why insulin resistance almost never means your hormones are just failing you out of nowhere, it means chronic stress has cortisol and adrenaline running the show, blocking insulin from doing its job.Why muscle matters so much, because it acts like a sink for glucose and improves your insulin sensitivity. And then we get real. Leila told me she had to make an actual appointment with herself to go to the gym because somewhere along the way she'd decided she didn't deserve to.If you've ever felt guilty for resting, for eating, for taking up space, this one's for you.comment POD397 and i'll send you the link to part 2.RESOURCES + LINKSMetabolic Reset ChallengeLearn more about our Winatlife Coaching optionsSaturée products use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first order.Pro-Metabolic Company use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first purchase.Drop Us A Review On The Podcast + Post a screenshot on Instagram stories and Tag @kittyblomfield for your chance to win a tub of Saturée Premium CollagenReview on SpotifyFOLLOWKitty Blomfield @kittyblomfieldLeila Lutz @leilalutzAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

My friend Leila never called herself an athlete. Never called it exercise. She just called it "clean living."It was slowly wrecking her thyroid.She's been a nutrition coach and personal trainer for 25 years. Had Hashimoto's her whole adult life. Trained clients all day, every day. Carried her own gym gear in and out of her car between sessions, then trained herself on top of that.One day she logged her food out of curiosity and found she'd eaten 1500 calories of fat in a single day. Looked at it, thought "that can't be right," and moved on with her life.We sat down and went right through her actual food and training history from back then. What was really happening in her body while she believed she was doing everything right. Why the number on the scale lied to her for years.Why a doctor once held her pulse and told her "your thyroid is screaming for help, you need to put weight on" and she said no, I'm fine, my bloods are fine.This one's a big episode so we've split it into two parts, this is part 1.RESOURCES + LINKSMetabolic Reset ChallengeLearn more about our Winatlife Coaching optionsSaturée products use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first order.Pro-Metabolic Company use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first purchase.Drop Us A Review On The Podcast + Post a screenshot on Instagram stories and Tag @kittyblomfield for your chance to win a tub of Saturée Premium CollagenReview on SpotifyFOLLOWKitty Blomfield @kittyblomfieldLeila Lutz @leilalutzAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

A few weeks ago, I interviewed @petajean on the podcast. I just love her and her perspective. We yapped for so bloody long that I split it into two, so this is part two of the episode.Something came up at the end of this podcast with Peta that I think a lot of women need to hear.Someone in my community had bought her book and left a comment saying, doesn't Peta believe in just eating intuitively? Isn't that what she teaches? Why would she join a structured programme?I love this question because it gets to the heart of something we get wrong about intuitive eating all the time.Intuitive eating is the goal. Genuinely. Once you understand your body, once you have built the foundation of knowing what you actually need, you should be eating in a way that feels natural and effortless.But you can not intuitively eat if you have no idea what your body needs. And a lot of women who think they are eating intuitively are just undereating and calling it intuition.Peta joined our program because she wanted specific results. She wanted to get stronger. She wanted accountability. She wanted someone to see things she could not see herself. And she is honest enough to admit that there is nothing wrong with that.Structure is not the enemy of freedom. Done right, it is how you get there.She also said something I think about a lot, that it is okay to want to be leaner, stronger, more toned. You are allowed to want that. You are allowed to work for it. It does not make you vain or disordered or not aligned with body positivity.It just has to come from love, not punishment.This is part 2, if you haven’t listened to part 1 go back and listen to it first.RESOURCES + LINKSMetabolic Reset ChallengeLearn more about our Winatlife Coaching optionsSaturée products use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first order.Pro-Metabolic Company use discount code KITTY20 for 20% off your first purchase.Drop Us A Review On The Podcast + Post a screenshot on Instagram stories and Tag @kittyblomfield for your chance to win a tub of Saturée Premium CollagenReview on SpotifyFOLLOWKitty Blomfield @kittyblomfieldPeta Kelly @petajeanAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands