Kitty Blomfield: Strong and Toned Without Restrictive Diets + Better Stress Resilience

[00:00:05] Krati: I know you have an anti dieting stance, so I would like to know more about that.

[00:00:10] Kitty: Well, I would say that I wouldn’t recommend dieting, you know, I think when women come to us, a lot of them are wanting to lose weight. So, you know, in order for your body to lose weight, you need to eat in a calorie deficit, I think. Uh, and this is just also from my own journey, so just to give you a really quick…

[00:00:28] Kitty: You know, I won’t take, take too much time. But, you know, I started dieting when I was 17. I spent, um, you know, all, all of my 20s, pretty much my early 30s, jumping from quick fix diet to quick fix diet. Um, you know, trying to reach this number on a scale because I thought if I just could get to 62 kilos, if I looked a certain way.

[00:00:47] Kitty: Uh, you know, I would be happy and I pretty much destroyed my body in the process. You know, this constant under eating, binge eating. I drank excessively too on the weekends. Um, and I ended up with hormonal [00:01:00] imbalances. You know, I had a miscarriage. I did have poor sleep. I was constipated, low energy, hair was falling out, uh, and I just had such a poor relationship with food.

[00:01:11] Kitty: And so that all changed for me in 2014. And I was working actually in a mine site doing FIFO and I just left my husband. So I straight away got in the next crazy restrictive, you know, 12 week. 

[00:01:25] Kitty: diet at the gym where basically I ate 1200 calories for 12 weeks and I lost all this weight. So I thought, you know, if I could just be skinny kitty, it’ll make me happy.

[00:01:32] Kitty: So obviously I was feeling pretty sad from the divorce and you know, I got to my goal weight, but you know, then I started binge eating again and all my issues, you know, same issues, shitty sleep, low energy, uh, and it was actually really distracting me from my work. And so my boss at the time, he was South African.

[00:01:48] Kitty: He basically sat me down and said, if you don’t get your shit together, I’m going to fire you. And that really scared me because I didn’t want to lose this job. So, you know, I went back to my little room on my, on the [00:02:00] mine site and I cried and I cried and I cried and I thought, all right, you got to get your shit together, kitty.

[00:02:03] Kitty: So I went out and, you know, like researched everything about nutrition, like just started to looking into like metabolism and binge eating. And, you know, I came across. Actually now my business partner in Saturay,

[00:02:18] Kitty: um, and I emailed her and I said to her, wow, like I’ve read this article defending fruit and other non complex carbs. And when I read it, I thought, oh, wow, this is actually, I’m, I’m like doing the opposite of this. You know, I don’t eat fruit. I don’t eat dairy. You know, I eat really low calories, have these incessant cravings.

[00:02:32] Kitty: I binge eat all the time. And so it, a lot of these light bulbs were going off. So I worked with her for 12 weeks. I met my partner, Craig. And so. How I used to train was I did a ton of cardio, hit classes, boot camps, ran heaps, six to seven days a week, just punishing myself pretty much for all the dieting and the binge eating.

[00:02:50] Kitty: And then he taught me how to strength train, and I loved it. Like, to adapt to water, and I ended up doing, competing in powerlifting, and, you know, combined, you know, I learnt about, [00:03:00] you know, eating to support my metabolism and health, and balanced hormones, and eating more, and, you know, I could eat carbohydrates.

[00:03:05] Kitty: I didn’t have to cut sugar and dairy and all these delicious foods and bread. And then Craig really taught me how to strength train to get stronger and change my body composition. Um, and it transformed my body and my health and, you know, it changed my life so much that I ended up leaving my job in mining, opening a gym with Craig.

[00:03:20] Kitty: We spent three years developing our methodology there, and then we decided to, um, create a program for women. To help free them from restrictive diets, you know, improve all the symptoms like me and then help them change their body composition so they could achieve this healthy, strong tone body without all these crazy restrictive diets and just really repair their relationship with food.

[00:03:40] Kitty: And then, yeah, I created my other company Saturay with Emma. Um, so basically we, we sell like metabolically supportive supplements and skincare. And yeah, that’s, I guess, sorry. That’s a bit of a roundabout way to answer the question, but it’s, you know, I think women. You know, they want to lose weight. They want to achieve this toned athletic body, but they [00:04:00] just go and do all these crazy, unrealistic, restrictive diets, completely cut carbs, which just leads to binge eating and health issues, I think, especially when they do it over years and years and years.

[00:04:10] Kitty: And then throw in all the stress, you know, kids, work, you know, all these other stresses in their life. Um, so yeah, I think it’s just a much more sustainable and healthy approach. And instead of always focusing only on weight loss on the scales, we focus on body recomposition. So building more muscle, you know, so you might end up at maybe a bit heavier weight than you ideally wanted to be, but you look better because you’ve got more muscle.

[00:04:34] Kitty: Does that make sense?

[00:04:35] Krati: Yes, yes, yes. Okay, so that’s a fascinating story. And I think that really clarifies that you have to have the right objective as you go into all of these things. Instead of trying to look skinny, you should just try to be healthier and more, you know, like the fitness should be the objective more than anything else.

[00:04:54] Krati: And like for my audience, what we focus on What I want to focus on for this episode is [00:05:00] how we can like for most of my audience are people who are very mission focused to have a lot of goals that they need to achieve. So they need to constantly keep up their performance to a very demanding schedule. So we want to understand how best we can sustain a performance like that while taking care of our body while staying at our healthiest.

[00:05:20] Krati: Because as I’ve come to understand, the more you want to do with. Your life you your health has to be prioritized because unless you are healthy in body in mind You really cannot sustain. I don’t think you can sustain much of a schedule because you get tired very easily Yeah, so,

[00:05:39] Kitty: 100% relate to that because we, I run two businesses, um, start work at seven, finish at six, I train heavy and hard and I wouldn’t be able to do those things if I wasn’t properly fueling my body with the right nutrients, you know, getting daily activity and getting sunlight, things like that.

[00:05:54] Kitty: So I 100% agree with you because I think what can happen, and I noticed this [00:06:00] actually with a lot of people in my old business coaching group is they all got burnt out. They all got burnt out. Like, I mean, you obviously can’t, um, if you’ve got excessive stress and you’re not sleeping enough, you know, there’s no amount of food or nutrients.

[00:06:12] Kitty: It’s going to, um, uh, I guess help you in that area because at some point you have to try and reduce the stress. But I think you can increase your stress resilience and you can increase your capacity to do more and cope with a higher workload when you’re actually nourishing your body and eating adequate calories.

[00:06:31] Kitty: If that makes sense.

[00:06:32] Krati: okay. Okay, I would like to understand that better with Like what do you mean by stress resilience?

[00:06:40] Kitty: So, you know, you think like your body can handle so much stress, right? So like, you know, if you, let’s say, let’s say that you’re, imagine you’re going to drive a car to the other side of India and you only put half a tank of fuel in, in it, what’s going to happen? It’s going to conk out, right? Yeah. So, um, [00:07:00] your body, it’s not like a car.

[00:07:01] Kitty: So if you’re constantly under eating, if you’ve got a lot of stress in your life from like, say, work or relationships, you know, your body just doesn’t suddenly go, okay, I don’t have enough fuel and nutrients. I’m going to conk out. It actually has built in mechanisms to help it survive. So it raises stress hormones, adrenaline, cortisol, and they create fuel through a process called gluconeogenesis.

[00:07:22] Kitty: So creating it from protein and fat. Now that, that, that process is very stressful on the body. Um, you know, you do need it obviously in emergency situations, but if you’re constantly running on stress hormones, your body is going to down regulate things like. Digestion, you know, reproduction. So a lot of women that we work with and maybe women who are listening to this might have crappy cycles, heavy, irregular, painful cycles.

[00:07:46] Kitty: You know, you sleep. Um, if you’re not eating enough, if you’re very stressed, you’re not going to sleep through the night. So that, you know, you’re not going to be able to recover. Um, so if you’re constantly, I guess, your energy, um, demands exceed your [00:08:00] energy intake, your body starts to break down. And it wants to try and conserve energy.

[00:08:05] Kitty: So it conserves things from, you know, like reproduction is not necessary for you to survive. So your body, it’s going to affect your cycle, um, and your sex hormone production, your thyroid, you know, uh,

[00:08:16] Krati: Right Yes, absolutely makes sense. Okay, so if we wanted to make that an objective, like stress resilience would be withstanding all that stress in the healthiest possible way, how would we go about that?

[00:08:29] Kitty: So I think, you know, again, like, um, I think obviously you should be able to cope with normal amounts of stress in your life. Like you can’t wrap yourself in a bloody cotton wool, right? I think if you’ve got a lot of ongoing chronic emotional stress, there’s no amount of food that’s probably going to help you.

[00:08:45] Kitty: You have to look at the actual stress, but let’s just say it’s a normal amount of stress in your daily life. So I think number one is you want to make sure you’re actually eating adequate calories. You know, you’re getting adequate protein, you’re eating enough carbs. So. You know, your liver can’t do its job if you don’t need enough protein.

[00:08:59] Kitty: [00:09:00] You’re not going to be able, protein is needed to create thyroid hormone. Um, you know, it’s the building blocks of your muscle and your tissues. And so if you’re not actually fueling your body adequately, you’re going to be running off those stress hormones. I think that’s number one is actually making sure you’re eating enough.

[00:09:15] Kitty: Um, and I actually, we recommend to all our clients is. So, you know, once you found that maintenance calories and that’s going to differ for everyone is doing like planning ahead, you know, so I’m sure most people that listen to this in their business, you know, you have plans, right? You have schedules, you have projects.

[00:09:31] Kitty: So you don’t just turn up to work every day and go. You know, what am I just, what am I doing today? Like without any idea. So I think the food is the same thing. And one thing that’s really helped me is, you know, I’ll sit down the week before, figure out, you know, what am I going to have for breakfast? What am I gonna have for lunch?

[00:09:45] Kitty: What I have it in the fridge ready to 12 calls and two podcasts. To record today, as well as my other work, right? That’s a pretty crazy schedule. I have my meals ready to go. So I had my [00:10:00] breakfast, uh, my next meal is potatoes with butter and prawns. I’ve already cooked it, have a glass of juice. So it’ll take me 10 minutes to eat it.

[00:10:06] Kitty: My afternoon tea is yogurt and fruit. So having that food planned in advance ensures that I’m getting adequate calories throughout the day. I’m balancing my blood sugar. And that, you know, because this is quite a taxing day. For me, you know, it’s, it’s, it’s draining. It can be draining doing a lot of calls and a lot of podcasts.

[00:10:21] Kitty: So if I’m not well fueled, I’ll get to the end of the day. I’ll be starving. I won’t be able to sleep and cope with that sort of stress. Does that make sense?

[00:10:29] Krati: Yes, absolutely. That that helps a lot. If I, if you were to place these things that I’m going to list in an order of priority, where would you place them on the list? So food, sleep, exercise, emotional well being?

[00:10:44] Kitty: Oh God, that’s hard. Like I think, I mean, emotional wellbeing is, is very critical. Obviously, I think, you know, not like with clients, if we’ve been working with them, they’re eating really well, but they’ve got a lot of emotional stress going on. They still can’t say, but I think probably I would say food, [00:11:00] food.

[00:11:00] Kitty: Number one is nutrition. Make sure your body is well fueled. You’re eating nutrient dense foods, eating adequate calories, sleep, you know, always sleep. And then exercise, I think, you know, and in terms of. The type of exercise. I think strength training is really good, but if you can’t walking, just get out and walk, you know, even if you’re so busy, get up in the morning, have your breakfast.

[00:11:19] Kitty: You could go for a 10 minute walk three times a day. You know, if you say after lunch, you went for a walk after breakfast, um, I mean, I think they’re all important.

[00:11:28] Krati: Yeah, of course.

[00:11:29] Kitty: It’s hard, it’s hard, but I think in terms of what you can control, you know, food first, sleep is so important, and then your training.

[00:11:37] Kitty: That’s probably the order that I would prioritize them in.

[00:11:40] Krati: Okay. All right. Uh, and we, you’ve mentioned strength training. Do you think strength training gives you like has an advantage over cardio? Because I know a lot of people will always pick one over the other. Cause it’s like, for me, I love strength training, but I’m not such a fan of cardio, but I always worry that cardio is just as [00:12:00] important or I’m missing out on something. So I would love to know

[00:12:03] Kitty: look, I think with our clients, we, cause sometimes, you know, like you can’t do all things, you know, so I would say if you only had a certain amount of time, I would, you know, be strength training first and building muscle. And then I would be including some daily activity like walking. So that’s really super easy.

[00:12:21] Kitty: Then if you had more time and you enjoyed it, you could do something like some, you know, zone two cardio, um, for cardiovascular health. So that’s basically, you know, getting your heart rate into that. Yeah. moderate cardio. And if you love that, you could do a bit of hit once a week or something like that.

[00:12:36] Kitty: But I think I think, I mean, everyone needs muscle, you know, especially as we age, we lose muscle, you know, it’s important for mobility, it’s like a sink for glucose. So it, um, it helps improve insulin sensitivity. So I, I always say to women, you know, get like two to three days a week, strength training, then get you some steps in.

[00:12:55] Kitty: And then if you wanted to add in the cardio, the other cardio,

[00:12:58] Krati: Mm hmm.

[00:12:58] Kitty: it in that order in [00:13:00] priority.

[00:13:00] Krati: Okay. Okay. That makes sense. I, for myself, I alternate between HIIT and yoga. Love those two.

[00:13:06] Kitty: Yeah. And I think too, you’ve got to do what you like,

[00:13:10] Kitty: you know, what you enjoy. So do your strength training to build muscle. And if you love HIIT, do a HIIT session once a week. If you love yoga, go and do some yoga as well.

[00:13:19] Krati: I agree with you on that. If you don’t enjoy the exercise, I don’t think you’re gonna stick to it for very long. Eventually you’re just gonna go back to, you know, procrastinating and constantly putting it off. Yeah.

[00:13:29] Kitty: agree.

[00:13:30] Krati: Okay. Uh, I want to understand from you, this is something I’ve come across on your website about, uh, pro metabolic nutrition. Where, where does metabolism come in, uh, in this conversation? What kind of role does it play? You also mentioned sugar. Were we gonna come, come to that? After this, I would want to understand pro metabolic nutrition, the role that metabolism plays in, in us losing weight, in us being healthier, uh, fitter, and, and [00:14:00] why is metabolic, everybody’s metabolism so different.

[00:14:03] Krati: Right.

[00:14:04] Kitty: I think, you know, like if you looked at someone who had a healthy metabolism, you know, like what are the attributes that that person would have? So you would sleep through the night uninterrupted, you know, healthy cycle, good libido, steady energy. Um, you know, bowel movement one to three times a day, um, you know, can maintain your weight without excessive dieting, um, or excessive exercise.

[00:14:28] Kitty: So when your metabolism is functioning well, then, you know, you will have all of these good, you know, warm body instead of cold hands and feet. So I think, um, but you know, there’s so many life, like I think a lot of women to, you know, they’ll come to me, Oh, my metabolism. So shit, I’ve got a shit metabolism.

[00:14:45] Kitty: I’m like, but it’s really your, the reason that it’s like that is because you’re of your diet lifestyle and training choices. So there’s a lot of things that you can do to actually support good metabolic functions. So like we talked about actually eating adequate calories, you know, getting adequate protein, [00:15:00] um, you know, balancing your blood sugar, eating regular meals, whatever suits you, getting adequate.

[00:15:04] Kitty: sleep, getting sunshine, getting daily activity, doing some strength training. So building more muscle actually increase your resting metabolic weight. It’s one of the best things that you can do for your metabolic rate. So, you know, I think it’s, um, you know, if you eat a lot of women, I think when they do these diets, they down regulate their metabolism.

[00:15:23] Kitty: It adapts basically because they’re constantly under eating, but you can improve it and you can improve. And I think it’s important to, you know, you want to look a certain way, but you want to be healthy. as well. Not at the expense of your health. So I think a lot of women, I know you do women and men and men do the same, but I think women particularly, I just want to achieve this number on the scale and I don’t care if it costs me my sleep, my digestion, shitty cycles.

[00:15:49] Krati: Okay. That makes a lot of sense. So are there any foods that you recommend over others that would help you with this goal of

[00:15:58] Krati: improving

[00:15:59] Kitty: I think,

[00:15:59] Krati: [00:16:00] Yeah.

[00:16:00] Kitty: so I think, you know, when, when women come into our program, we, we want them to eat nutrient dense, easy to digest foods. So, um, you know, food bioavailability is important. So, you know, there are foods that contain nutrients, but they may not be very bioavailable. So for example, green veggies, um, you know, nuts and seeds, they contain substance.

[00:16:21] Kitty: That actually, um, you know, can inhibit the digestion of the nutrients. Now, I’m not saying never eat them, but you know, people I think have a really, and it’s because of the fitness industry, I was the same. They’re like, oh, kale’s a super food, you know, um, nuts and seeds and chai seeds where, you know, no one’s eating liver.

[00:16:39] Kitty: Like, beef liver is one of the most nutrient dense foods on the planet. It’s got a week’s worth of vitamin A, CoQ10, copper. Um, you know, it’s packed with nutrients. Oysters, good quality dairy, fruits. So, you know, what are the foods that contain the nutrients that my body needs in a form that I can easily digest?

[00:16:59] Kitty: Uh, so, you [00:17:00] know, like things like nuts, seeds, green veggies, they’re pretty hard for your body to digest and irritate the intestinal walls. I’m not saying never eat them, but I think what a lot of women do is they think they need to eat clean. So that is cutting out dairy, cutting out fruit. So you’re cutting out a lot of nutrients from your diet that your body needs.

[00:17:18] Kitty: So you just want to give your body the nutrient needs. in a form that they can easily digest. So, you know, like, for example, we would get people to eat shellfish. Um, we recommend eating liver, good quality dairy, fruits, fresh, ripe, in season fruits, um, juice if you enjoy it, uh, bioavailable animal protein, so like eggs, seafood, beef, lamb, chicken, um, collagen.

[00:17:42] Kitty: So, you know, traditionally, I think, um, you know, People would stew the whole animal, you know, we’d get all the joints and the connective tissue, so it’d give us a lot of gelatin. Now, we just seem to eat the muscle meat, so, you know, like, one of my favourite things is beef cheeks, um, or oxtail stew, or [00:18:00] lamb necks, or I’ll do chicken feet.

[00:18:02] Kitty: Chicken baked broth. So I think they’re very traditional, you know, old fashioned nutrient dense foods and they’re yummy too, you know, like Potatoes with butter and salt with a glass of juice or some yummy, you know in the mornings I’ll have um, like eggs on sourdough bread with juice. So they it’s tasty delicious easy to digest foods Yeah, because obviously like you think if your body’s getting the nutrients it needs it’s gonna function Well, it’s going to have a better chance of functioning well, um, you know, compared to if you’re, you know, starving it of nutrients.

[00:18:34] Krati: absolutely. And at this point, I have to ask, do you think we can achieve all of these fitness goals with a vegetarian diet?

[00:18:43] Kitty: Our nutrition approach is not suitable for vegetarians. I mean, it depends. Like, when you say vegetarian, can you eat eggs? Can you eat seafood?

[00:18:53] Krati: So if, as an Indian, I would tell you in India, vegetarian basically means no egg,

[00:18:58] Kitty: No meat,

[00:18:59] Krati: [00:19:00] like, no

[00:19:00] Kitty: seafood, yeah.

[00:19:01] Krati: all. Yeah.

[00:19:02] Kitty: It makes it much more difficult, um, not impossible, like you would have to do some serious supplementation because there’s certain nutrients that you can only get from animal products, um, so like vitamin A, the usable form of vitamin A retinol is only found in animal products, you know, a lot of, you know, like zinc you can get from some um, non animal products, but like, you can get more, much more, um, and there’s other, Nutrients too.

[00:19:27] Kitty: So it does, like we, if someone came to us and said, Oh, look, we’re vegetarian. We would just say, look, our program isn’t suitable.

[00:19:34] Krati: Okay, that makes sense. Okay. Yeah. Now I have a lot of questions here. Let me just Uh, okay, so we talked about metabolism, we talked about the food that we can Sugar! Yes, I want to talk about sugar because so much of the fitness content out there has created this almost fear in people of sugar and that you You kind of have to give it up [00:20:00] completely if you want to achieve certain fitness goals, like I, uh, have sugar, two spoons of sugar, two cups of coffee in one day, two spoons of sugar, but then sugar isn’t everything, right?

[00:20:11] Krati: We, we now know that all of these products that are available on the market that say sugar free are actually not sugar free. They have so much sugar in them. There’s been so much controversy and so much, uh, so many articles around that. So I get that, but at the same time, if. Sugar is in every product, and then you’re creating all of this stress around sugar wherein people are constantly obsessed with watching out for it.

[00:20:35] Krati: Like, am I eating sugar? Oh, is this, is this going to hurt my fitness goals? That’s just, I, I feel like that’s counterproductive. That’s just now creating all of this stress and I don’t know what, like this is something that often comes up in my conversations with my friends, with my family. whole struggle with sugar

[00:20:54] Kitty: totally. And it’s like, but you, if you ask them, so like, I was the same, I was the sugar Antichrist, but when you actually [00:21:00] look at basic human physiology, your cells primary and preferred fuel source is glucose. So your cells make energy from glucose. So why would you cut it out? You know, it just doesn’t make any sense.

[00:21:12] Kitty: And I think you have to, it’s like sugar itself isn’t the issue. It’s what is the sugar coming with? So, for example, you’re eating this shit donut cooked in vegetable oil with a ton of white sugar versus a piece of fruit that has nutrients and fiber in it. So, they still break down, like, the sugar. So, white cane sugar is structurally the same as the sugar found in fruit.

[00:21:38] Kitty: and honey and maple syrup and juice. It just has extra free molecules of glucose and fructose and then it also has fiber and nutrients. So I don’t think it’s sugar itself is the issue. It’s what are you having the sugar with? So like if I ever say to women, they’re like, I cut sugar out of my diet completely.

[00:21:56] Kitty: So I say to them, okay, cool. Were you eating ripe fruit, fresh orange [00:22:00] juice, root vegetables, dairy, maple syrup, honey, and some white sugar? They’re like, Oh God, no, I was eating. Processed cakes and biscuits and junk food basically that has white sugar in it, but then is devoid of any nutrients, has a heap of vegetable oils.

[00:22:15] Kitty: So sugar isn’t, I don’t think is the issue. It’s what it’s actually coming in with. So, and having a cup, like I have sugar in my coffee in the morning. I have ice cream at night that has sugar in it. Some white sugar in a nutrient dense diet is completely fine because You, you, like, depending on what your fitness goal is, if your goal is to lose weight, you need to eat in a calorie deficit.

[00:22:39] Kitty: So, you know, obviously, if you felt, got all your carbs from white sugar, that would be silly, because you’re just eating energy devoid of nutrients. But if you have some fruit, you have some root veggies, you have some honey, but then you have a couple of teaspoons of white sugar, that’s not a problem. It’s not.

[00:22:56] Krati: Okay, okay, that helps. I think that creates a sort of a safe boundary [00:23:00] around it because I do feel like all of this obsession with it is just sort of hurting you because even if you’re getting the calories right, but you’re that stressed out with with what goes into your body, because I don’t know if you believe in energy, but if you have that kind of stress around the food that goes into your body,

[00:23:20] Kitty: Yeah. Cause it’s like, like 80, 20, right? That’s what I say to people. Like it’s what you do 80, 90% of the time. So, you know, I’ll go out and we eat off the plan. I have some bloody drinks, you know, I don’t get smashed, but I don’t try and be perfect all the time. Cause you’re right. Stressing about being perfect is just putting all this stress on your body.

[00:23:38] Kitty: You know, you just want to eat nutrient dense foods most of the time. And then if you want to go and have a glass of wine, if you want to eat a Mars bar, if you want to go. Have some shitty takeaway food. You know, just do it, but don’t do it all the time.

[00:23:52] Krati: that makes that that really helps and now coming to the exercise part of things I’ve I will agree Or [00:24:00] at least I will state from my own experience that when you are it’s like I do 60 minutes of exercise every day And I do feel like it elevates my performance. It gives me better sleep I am more energetic, but I have to ask like what are the signs that help you understand that you’re doing too much How does it because our body always tells us what’s going on with it?

[00:24:18] Krati: So, how do we figure out when we are doing too much? When something needs to be like we need to eat more or we need to exercise less or we need to exercise more How do we spot those signs?

[00:24:29] Kitty: I think that’s a really good point. Like, you know, uh, like when women come into our program, we try and get them to move a bit more and eat a bit more and do a bit more and have a bit of a more high energy sort of lifestyle rather than saying cut calories and do, you know, more. Um, because I think, you know, like some people love to be really active, but you’ve got to make sure you’re actually feeling your body adequately.

[00:24:50] Kitty: So, you know, and I agree, like moving every day is just makes you feel amazing. Doing some resistance training, whatever it is that you enjoy doing is going to make you feel good. Um, you know, I [00:25:00] think some signs and it depends on what you’re doing. Like if you’re lifting, but you’d have to be pretty advanced athlete to, if you’re overtraining, you know, for me, my sleep, I’ll know when I need to get close to a D load, my sleep starts to get affected, you know, I might get Lightheaded during the day.

[00:25:14] Kitty: Really low energy. Um, you know, my cycle might get affected. So I think it’s looking at those like we call them the objective measures of metabolism. So like sleep, digestion, mood, energy, cycle issues. So sometimes again, it could be just like your body will reach the point where it’s a stressed. It’s a tolerance like it can get to here and then you do something that tips it over.

[00:25:33] Kitty: So I think it’s a balance of I mean, there’s so many factors that that can affect it. Like, it may not be that you’re training, it might be some other stresses, but I think you need to look at your body and go, Okay, do I have warm hands and feet? Do I sleep through the night most of the time? You know, do I have pretty stable energy?

[00:25:48] Kitty: Do I have regular and pain free cycles? And do I actually have a sex drive? Um, you know, stable moods, things like that. So if all of those things start to, if you’re like, Oh shit, I’m so tired all the time. I’m not [00:26:00] sleeping. My cycles, you know, I’m starting to get really regular. Then you know, okay. There’s, it’s, there’s something that you need to change, whether you need to eat more, reduce overall stress, you know, there could be a number of different factors, but I think looking at that and asking yourself, you know, because you should sleep through the night most of the time, you should have pretty stable energy, but it might not be about reducing specifically your training that might be the issue.

[00:26:23] Kitty: You know, I just, and as an example for myself, like I know, like we work a lot and you know, the day sometimes it’s full on and it’s not the training that I need to stop. Sometimes I just need to go, okay, 4 o’clock. I’m turning my phone off. I’m not looking on Instagram. You’re going to have a nice bath. I need to just sort of wind down and.

[00:26:39] Kitty: You know, it’s the work that’s sort of making me a bit frazzled or affecting my sleep. It’s not the training, so it could, I think it’s just, it’s a balance of all these different things. And once you get to know your body and your stress tolerance and what your, you know, for me, when I’ve done too much, it’s my cycle shortens and my sleep’s affected.

[00:26:59] Kitty: You know, I know that that’s [00:27:00] when I need

[00:27:00] Kitty: to sort of make some changes. So I think it’s looking at those things.

[00:27:05] Krati: Okay that that’s helpful. I I have to say like I work out like 60 minutes of yoga, cardio yoga, 40 minutes of HIIT. I sometimes find like after working out, like during the afternoon, I would find my hands are a little shaky. So I would sometimes be like, okay, so my muscles are getting too tired. Maybe I’m not eating enough.

[00:27:29] Krati: And I’ve started napping in

[00:27:31] Kitty: you’re not, yeah, it’s a sign of, I think, low blood sugar. So you, I think, you know, it’s important to, to make sure you eat before training. And then you want to eat a meal after training. So make sure you something with protein, good amount of carbs, small amount of fat, because that’s basically going to refuel.

[00:27:47] Kitty: Because so when you exercise, you’re going to deplete your glycogen stores. And so you want to have enough fuel to get you through your training session. And then you want to eat after to replenish. So I just think you probably need to, you know, eat maybe a bit more [00:28:00] after your training. And perhaps then eating maybe a mid afternoon snack, just to keep that blood sugar nice and stable.

[00:28:06] Krati: There is a lot of talk about having an empty stomach. For better gut health, your stomach needs to be empty some of the time, so you shouldn’t always be full. So the gut bacteria, I’m not very knowledgeable about this, I will tell you right now, so I’m just sharing something that I’ve learned from another podcast wherein they were talking about how when you are, when you start to feel hungry, the gut bacteria gets activated and it sort of cleans up your gut and that’s healthier for you. So that

[00:28:39] Kitty: I’ve never really heard anything like

[00:28:41] Kitty: that, like, um, to be honest, I’ve never really read about that. I just know from working with women in our program that, you know, we get them to eat regular meals to balance their blood sugar, you know, because when they’re hungry, it’s a sign that your body needs fuel.

[00:28:54] Kitty: Um, and, you know, when they actually eat adequate protein, carbs and fat throughout the day, balance, you know, [00:29:00] they usually eat between four to six meals, whatever works for them, then a lot of the issues start to improve because they’re actually giving their body the fuel and nutrients. So, yeah, I can’t really comment on that because I don’t know.

[00:29:09] Kitty: I’ve never

[00:29:09] Krati: Okay. Okay. Okay. That is all right. That, that, I think that that’s a good point to make if you, let’s not go down that road. Okay, but I have to ask this. I know a lot of like people who are very into high performance, uh, you know, entrepreneurs are doing a lot of things. They want to get everything right. So they, a lot of the time we would go for blood testing.

[00:29:32] Krati: We would go for the, any kind of testing that can give us information that we can build on. So you’ve shared a lot of great information here, but if I wanted to learn more about my body and if I wanted, like before I go to get to this supplement state, something we’re going to talk about, I would want to.

[00:29:47] Krati: No, what is working in my body, what is not working in my body, what my body specifically needs. Like you’ve already pointed out that people who eat vegetarian diet have a hard time getting certain nutritions, uh, certain nutrients. Sorry. So [00:30:00] if I wanted to figure that out, what do you ever recommend certain kind of tests to people, or basically if they were starting out at a base level, what would you recommend that they do first?

[00:30:11] Krati: Mm

[00:30:13] Kitty: I would look at you, because it’s free. Like, look at your symptoms. Because the thing is, like, a lot of women will come to us, oh, I’ve had all these blood tests, and they all say that everything’s normal, my thyroid’s normal, but they feel like shit. So blood tests, I think, obviously, you can use them in line with Looking at your symptoms too, but you can just do things like take your temperature and pulse, you know, so that’s a really cheap one So, you know, you want to wake you want to have a warm body?

[00:30:36] Kitty: So when your cells are producing energy a byproduct is heat so you should wake up, you know at about 36 point four, 36. 5 degrees, and it should rise up to around 37. Um, you know, look at your pulse. If you have a really low pulse, that’s not a good sign. It’s not a, you know, people think that having low pulse is cool, but it just means your cells aren’t getting the nutrients and energy enough of the nutrients that they need, because it’s your heartbeat is weak.

[00:30:59] Kitty: [00:31:00] So, you know, you can look at your temperature and pulse. You look at, look at your sleep, look at your digestion, look at your energy levels, look at your cycle, you know, cycle, I think for women’s like a fifth vital sign. you know, it’s like a report card every month. So I always say to people, like, look at your symptoms first.

[00:31:16] Kitty: Um, you know, before, and a lot of too, like the blood tests, like the ranges are based on unhealthy people, you know, like sick people. So I think, I’m not saying don’t go get blood tests, but maybe potentially work with a practitioner who will help you look at everything and might suggest some blood tests to go and do.

[00:31:35] Kitty: Um, cause I think the other thing too is people can get so hyper focused on trying to improve blood tests and like it’s only taking a snapshot of a point in time. You could take it half an hour later. It would be different. That makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. Cause it’s like, yeah. Cause again, like you say that the people on the same, you get so, it’s like, Oh, just chill out for a bit, you know, eat the food, you know, go get some sun, have a relax a little bit, you know, go have a bath, do some training.

[00:31:59] Kitty: Like you [00:32:00] get so hyper focused. I have to get this perfect. I have to get this blood market perfect, which causes you more stress.

[00:32:05] Krati: Right, right. Yeah, that makes sense. Okay, coming to the supplements now, because I know a lot of the people that I interact with, a lot of my clientele are people who want more out of life. They are constantly, they’re eating healthy already, they’re exercising, but they would say things like, no, but I, I’m already working nine hours.

[00:32:25] Krati: I want to be able to work 12 hours, make time for my family, exercise, take care of myself. I want to do all of

[00:32:30] Kitty: Well, you can’t do that, like, you can’t, your body, like, a supplement isn’t going to help you do that,

[00:32:36] Krati: Okay. Okay. So.

[00:32:37] Kitty: think there’s a certain point that you can work to with your body, but you’re only, you’re human,

[00:32:42] Krati: mm

[00:32:42] Kitty: saying that I want to work nine hours and train and have time for my family and do that every single day, seven days, like, that’s probably, I think, impossible, maybe, you know, I think you can obviously fuel your body, get adequate sleep and recovery, but there’s a point, right, and supplement, I think supplement, supplement’s like 10%, [00:33:00] of, of it.

[00:33:01] Kitty: Like supplements aren’t this magic fix that are going to help you. And I think too, like there’s no one magic supplement for everyone. So when women come into our program, we would work with them individually and only recommend specific supplements if we think that they needed it. So it’s not like everyone should take every supplement.

[00:33:17] Kitty: I just think supplements through people think that they’re the magic bullet. When really it’s more about am I eating enough, am I eating enough protein, am I getting the nutrients my body needs, am I getting adequate sleep, am I managing my stress, am I getting some sun, you know, am I in alignment with what I want to do, right, like a lot of people, am I doing what I really truly want to do in my life, um, you know, I find for me, if I’m ever out of alignment, that really stresses me out, you know, I just think, yeah, like, I’m not saying supplements aren’t beneficial, I take supplements.

[00:33:46] Kitty: But you’ve got to have the foundational work done first, I think.

[00:33:49] Krati: Okay. Okay. Okay. So I would like to know, uh, when, when is it okay for you to like start taking supplements because the people I’m talking about, these are high performing [00:34:00] individuals with excellent health. They simply want to push other limits. Right? So I, I have read a lot of science around supplements and I will honestly tell you I don’t understand it.

[00:34:13] Krati: Like, there are so many different schools of thought when it comes to supplements. So I would just like for, like to understand from you, at what point should you start considering supplements? And how do you go about it? Because I know that people just randomly take supplements and I don’t think that’s a very…

[00:34:30] Kitty: I think you need to, like, I mean, you need to work with a practitioner, work with someone, you know. Um, or test it yourself. All you can do is test it. You know, I’ve tested a million different supplements, and then things that make the biggest difference to me is eating enough food, eating nutrient sensitive food, getting enough sleep, getting enough sunlight.

[00:34:45] Kitty: There’s been no one supplement that I’ve taken that’s magically transformed my health, you know, um, there are things I think that definitely help. But again, it’s the foundation works. I think it’s too, it’s too hard. I can’t say like, because everyone’s different to, you know, there’s not going to be [00:35:00] this.

[00:35:00] Kitty: Everyone should take this supplement. Um, so, yeah, I mean, they just probably need to test it themselves, but ask themselves, are they doing getting all the foundations right, you know, and then they could just take it and see what happens.

[00:35:13] Krati: Right.

[00:35:14] Kitty: see how they feel, take it for a period of time.

[00:35:17] Krati: Okay. Okay. So the products that are under your brand, what are those products for? What can people get out of those products?

[00:35:25] Kitty: So we basically created hours of food supplements to rep, so as an example, we recommend people eat liver and oysters to get the nutrients. You know, they’ve got so many amazing nutrients in there, but a lot of women say, I don’t want to eat liver and oysters kitty. I don’t like eating liver, it’s disgusting.

[00:35:39] Kitty: So we just freeze dried liver. Um, we made a collagen. So, you know, you can make bone broths, you can cook up gelatinous stews. So, but if you don’t have time to do that, you can just take the collagen. So, basically what they are is they’re just replacing foods in the diet for convenience.

[00:35:56] Krati: Okay.

[00:35:56] Kitty: in our program that don’t take any of the supplements.

[00:35:58] Kitty: They just eat all the food.

[00:35:59] Krati: Mm [00:36:00] hmm. Mm

[00:36:00] Kitty: And then there’s other supplements that we would recommend, like, you know, there’s heaps of different ones, but again, it’s individual, and looking at the individual, because you may as well take less, like, why spend all this money on supplements? I’m not saying supplements aren’t valuable, again, because they are, why spend all this money on supplements that just aren’t really doing anything that you don’t need to?

[00:36:20] Krati: Okay. Okay. That helps. Uh, where the… Is fasting part of your program? Is fasting ever recommended? Mm

[00:36:27] Kitty: We don’t recommend fasting for women in our program, because a lot of women, I mean, if you’re healthy and fasting works for you, do it, but I think a lot of women in our program come with, you know, Digestive issues, sleep issues. So we need to fuel their body. We need to balance their blood sugar, keep their stress hormones low.

[00:36:42] Kitty: When you’re fasting, you can’t do that. So your body elevates stress hormones. Um, so yeah, for the women in our program, I mean, if it works for you and you’re healthy and you feel good, do it.

[00:36:52] Krati: Okay. So do you adapt the whatever you recommend as part of your program as part of like the the [00:37:00] regimen that you build for your clients? Do you ever adapt that to phases of life? Like if you’re on your period, do this. If you’re in menopause, things will change this way. So in that respect, because I think Because we don’t have that kind of intelligence, that kind of knowledge and education, we tend to follow the same kind of exercise routine, food, uh, plan, diet plan, all throughout the year, all throughout the month.

[00:37:26] Krati: But obviously when you’re on your period, your energy takes such a massive hit that if, like I work out, as I said, 60 minutes, I, it’s very hard for me to sustain that when I’m on my period. So do we

[00:37:39] Kitty: Look, I don’t really believe in the training with your cycle. I mean, I think you have to listen to your body, but I think there’s a lot of other things that affect your energy levels more. And if you are experiencing some, like, really low energy, you know, PMS symptoms, you should try and improve them. like fix the actual issue.

[00:37:59] Kitty: [00:38:00] Um, you know, but I always encourage women to listen to their bodies, you know, and if that works for them. But the issue is, it’s like if you’re only like I was listening to some interview and the woman saying, you know, don’t train for two weeks every month. I’m like, well, that means you’re only training six months a year.

[00:38:13] Kitty: So you’re not gonna make very much progress doing that, you know? So I think if you are experiencing some pretty major symptoms with your cycle, address the root cause, fix the symptoms. Cause that’s what I was like, I used to have shit heavy cycles, you know, I was tired, PMS, I don’t have any of that anymore, so I can train, all the time, you know, unless I’m tired, or I’ve had a bad sleep, or I’ve got a lot of stress going on, I’ll pull back the training, so I think it’s more looking at the client and their lifestyle, you know, what we prescribe, the basic fundamentals apply to a woman who’s in menopause, because when you go through menopause, if you have menopausal symptoms, or perimenopause, it’s just a sign that your body’s stressed, so instead of cycle issues, it’s Yeah, perimonopausal symptoms.

[00:38:50] Kitty: So the same principles apply, but it’s more looking at the client and their lifestyle and what they can do and then tailoring the program to suit them and their life. So you’re right, like if there’s a time [00:39:00] of very high stress, you might say to them, okay, let’s pull your training back to just two, three days a week for half an hour.

[00:39:06] Kitty: While you go through this stressful period, let’s focus more on walking and getting sun, stress management, making sure you’re eating enough food. So more in terms of, I think, looking at their life, um, rather than, cause it’s the same, like the, we, we, we prescribe the same principles, similar type foods to women in menopause and it fixes their menopausal symptoms, you know, which fixes the women’s cycle issues.

[00:39:29] Kitty: So I think all those things are just, they’re signs that the body is stressed. It’s telling you I’m stressed.

[00:39:35] Krati: Okay. Okay. I love that you shared like so much information around how we can be our healthiest self and also given permission to slow things down because I think that is something we struggle with. We, like, I myself feel like, no, no, no. I gotta keep going. There’s so much to be done. Yeah, but I think we need to remember that.

[00:39:56] Kitty: But you’ll burn yourself out. I mean, you can eat, like, I’m pretty [00:40:00] bloody diligent with my food recovery, and it’s still, I have days, like, you know, we’re so busy this week, and I’m not sleeping that well because I’m so busy, and I know at the end of the week, like, tonight, I might have a bath, and I’ll, because I couldn’t keep this pace up all the time, so there might be periods of time where you push it hard, and then you might pull back a little bit, but you can’t, I think it’s unrealistic to say that you can go 100 miles an hour all the time.

[00:40:23] Kitty: You just can’t.

[00:40:24] Krati: Yeah. I think that is…

[00:40:26] Kitty: Yeah. Yeah,

[00:40:27] Krati: I think that’s something that we also need to stop doing like all the stressing out all the time about what am I? Putting in my body. How much am I exercising? I think sometimes I would have to consciously tell myself just stop.

[00:40:40] Kitty: yeah,

[00:40:40] Kitty: totally. Totally. Yeah, cause some weeks like, there’ll be some weeks where I’m only trained twice. Because if something’s happened at work, I just don’t worry about it now. I just go, okay, it’s what I do most of the time that matters. Um, and sometimes you just need to have a rest or I’ll go in if I’m tired and I’ll only do one set of every exercise and I’ll pull the weight back.

[00:40:58] Kitty: So it doesn’t matter if I don’t make progress this week. [00:41:00] It’s just about moving and doing something. You know, or just going for a walk instead. Um, and I don’t worry about it. Cause I know that that’s what my body needs at that time.

[00:41:11] Krati: Okay, so how can people work with you? And I would also love to know what fitness, uh, experts do you follow? What books would you recommend or podcasts you would recommend so people can like add to their knowledge?

[00:41:26] Kitty: I really like, um, Kate Dearing, how to heal your metabolism. So I recommend get her book. It’s a really great book to read. Um, and then you can find us, uh, like I’m on Instagram kitty Blomfield. Um, and then our website, new strength. com. au. And we have a seven day program, which is a great introduction to what we do and all of our concepts.

[00:41:46] Kitty: Um, and then, you know, people, if they go, like I follow a lot of other people are now sort of, um, that sort of follow this pre metabolic approach. So you can have a look in there. There’s lots of different people. And if you actually, I’ve got a podcast too. So I’ve interviewed a lot [00:42:00] of great people on the podcast.

[00:42:01] Kitty: So it’s called the Weight Loss Women Eat More, Train Less, Get Results podcast. That would probably be a good resource to go through because all the people that I’ve interviewed on there sort of have a similar approach to us and maybe work with different niches.

[00:42:12] Krati: Yeah. Okay. I’m going to share the links to everything that you’ve just mentioned in the episode description. So on the podcast platforms, it’s going to be in the episode description and the same goes for YouTube. So that’s great. Uh, now I have to ask you, like, if you had the power to reach into like the minds of every individual in the world, what would you like tweak in there for them to have the healthiest possible life?

[00:42:38] Krati: If you could just make them do anything. Or change anything in their, in how their mind is set up. What would you do?

[00:42:45] Kitty: Oh God, that’s a hard question because how is their mind set up? Like everyone is different. That’s a hard, I don’t know if I can answer that question.

[00:42:52] Krati: I like to ask like a weird question in the end just to get to know my guests a little bit better. I think it, it helps us to know the people.

[00:42:59] Kitty: [00:43:00] question, I have no idea how I would answer that question.

[00:43:02] Krati: Okay. Um, yeah. Okay. So let’s, uh, simplify that too. If you could. Get people world over like, you know, everyone was listening to you. Every single human being in the world was listening to you. And if you could give them one message and tell them to do one thing in their life, what would that one thing be for them to be healthier?

[00:43:25] Kitty: don’t know, just do something you enjoy.

[00:43:27] Krati: Okay.

[00:43:27] Kitty: Do work that you enjoy. Have a purpose in life.

[00:43:31] Krati: Okay. Have a purpose in life. That’s interesting. That’s interesting. Okay. Any other message you have for my audience?

[00:43:39] Kitty: Uh, I think, like, go back to basics. Like, you can get so caught up in supplements and biohacks, and I think most people just aren’t actually tracking their food, eating adequate protein, getting the right nutrients, prioritizing sleep, getting some daily movement. It’s actually not that hard. And I think we think that there’s more to it, but I feel like so many people are [00:44:00] just not doing the basics.

[00:44:01] Kitty: And, right, or enough, and then they’re looking for all these 1% things, like what’s the supplement that I can take? Well, are you actually eating enough? You know, are you getting adequate sleep? And those big, I’m not saying, again, supplements aren’t beneficial, but you want to focus on the big rocks first and nail them.

[00:44:18] Krati: Okay. Thank you for that. Thank you for saying that. Because so many of us need to be reminded of that. Like basic is good. Like go back to the basics as you said, and stop obsessing so much about all of these things that the experts online are recommending. And I think some of what we learn online, like uh, I learn, I’ve learned so much from your content is great and it’s so immensely helpful.

[00:44:41] Krati: But there is so much information available that at some point I think we try to do too much and try to get like all kinds of benefits and in doing so I think we end up hurting our bodies.

[00:44:53] Krati: So

[00:44:53] Kitty: Yeah, I think too, like, if you’re serious, work with someone, get coaching, you know, you just gonna, and drown out the [00:45:00] noise, obviously work with someone that you feel drawn to and you think that’s gonna be able to help you, that aligns with you and will help you achieve your goals, but I’ve always invested in coaching,

[00:45:09] Krati: yeah, that’s, that’s, I would love for you to like explain that to my listeners because I think picking a coach is no easy thing to do. I know that I often get client calls that I then have to Like turn down, uh the client because I know for a fact that the way I speak And the things that I will bring up it will never work for this person.

[00:45:30] Krati: So I have to let them go So I know picking a coach is not easy now when it comes to your body when it comes to fitness when it comes to Nutrition and all of those things. How do you pick the right coach? What do you look for? Because I, uh, I’m sorry. I just finished. Let me just finish my question here, because this is something that I do know.

[00:45:49] Krati: A lot of people do unconsciously. What we do is the beliefs that we already have. We try to pick people who are simply going to confirm what we already believe, even [00:46:00] if what we already believe does not work for us. We don’t like to be challenged. So, but at the

[00:46:05] Kitty: you just, I’m just conscious of the time, so I’m going to call in a few

[00:46:10] Kitty: minutes, but I think you need, you need to ask yourself too, like, is what I’m doing working, right? So I may believe this, but is it actually working for my body? Am I sleeping? Am I at my goal body composition, you know, and I think when you choose a coach in health and fitness, steer away from anyone that’s promising a quick fix, because you just can’t get there quickly, you’ll rebound, you know, look for someone that has helped people like you with the same issues.

[00:46:33] Kitty: You know, look for, like, have they got client testimonials, you know? Like, we’ve got hundreds, and we interview our clients. Um, you know, because women who come to us, they don’t want a quick fix. They want sustainable, they want to get healthy, they want to change their body composition. Um, and you know, look at the coaching, and is it going to fit you?

[00:46:51] Kitty: Is it going to give you the level of support and accountability you need? Because obviously it’s going to cost more.

[00:46:55] Kitty: Um, but I think it’s, yeah, like, I always, like, coaches that I work with, I look, okay, [00:47:00] do they have the results that I want? You know, and is it going to be able to achieve it, you know, in a sustainable way?

[00:47:06] Kitty: So if they’re offering some magic quick figs run, I think, you know, because

[00:47:10] Krati: Right. Okay.

[00:47:11] Kitty: do it.

[00:47:12] Krati: Okay. That’s, that’s helpful. All right. Thank you so much, Kitty. I know you have another call, so I’ll let you go. Thank you so much for all that you’ve shared today. It’s been immensely helpful. Okay. Let me just stop the recording.

[00:47:27] Kitty: I was like, Oh God, this is.