38 Pounds Lost and 250% Stronger: Would You Follow This Fitness Plan?

Welcome to The Fully Fit, your go-to spot for fitness, nutrition and lifestyle improvement.

👋 Huge shout-out to the new readers who joined the community this week!

My goal is to provide you with the kind of advice and support that I'd offer my best friends: honest, optimistic, actionable and time-tested. Rooted in science but adapted to real life.

Today I want to take one real fitness transformation story and put it under the microscope.

I'll break down the numbers, the story, and the challenges so that you can see exactly how the women and men I work with reach and surpass their fitness goals.

This week's transformation: a 40 year old woman with post-COVID weight/health concerns, new to strength training and just not feeling like herself anymore.

Let's dive in...

How It Started

After struggling to lose weight she'd gained during COVID, Whitton realized that she didn't just need accountability, she needed someone to hold her accountable.

Whitton is busy. She's an actress, producer and DJ with an unpredictable schedule as well as work and social commitments that take her all over the world. That's what opened her mind to training virtually: workout anywhere, any time, regardless of her physical location, or her trainers.

These are some of the concerns we talked about during her Strategy Session:

• Her doctor had recently expressed concerns about cholesterol, high blood pressure and prediabetes

• She wasn't feeling like herself. She wanted to get back to being a confident woman who loved trying on clothes, who didn't worry about her weight at auditions (industry reality), hghj

• She'd worked with a trainer before, but she didn't enjoy it because she could never tell if she was getting any better - she couldn't tell if it was working.

• She didn't have the discipline or the knowledge she realized she needed to get real, sustainable results.

She'd also grown up in a household in which weight was "a thing". Part of what she hoped to get in working together was a more positive relationship with diet and exercise: moving because it made her happy, feeling empowered to nourish her body well.

What Happened Next

Whitton had worked with a trainer before. But she'd confessed that though she was familiar with compound movements - squats, deadlifts, lunges, pushes and pulls - she'd never been able to tell if she was doing them effectively. Plus she had been experiencing some pain in her elbow and general tightness that was uncomfortable.

So the first thing we did was a 90 minute fitness assessment during which we worked through a series of mobility drills and worked step-by-step through the compound lifts that form the foundation of her entire program.

We also set up a schedule:

The Foundation Phase

And we spent 3 full weeks in a Foundation Phase to set her solidly and confidently up for long-term success.

The Foundation Phase is - in my opinion - absolutely crucial to a successful fitness journey. And it's so often skipped.

The Foundation Phase gives the opportunity to do 4 things:

• collect and solidify a baseline - unique to that person - for an effective, progressive journey

• establish a strong physical, mental and environmental baseline at all levels

• dial in support habits like stress management, sleep and energy quality

• create a standard from which to track progress

It's not that we don't continue to do these things beyond the Foundation Phase.

It's that these are the main goal of this entire phase. Over weight loss. Over muscle gain. The client might see some of that - and we did: Whitton lost about 4 pounds during this time - but that's the main goal of these weeks.

The main reason I do this is because a lot of women come to me wanting to lose weight, but they've spent so many years yo-yo dieting, over-training and burning the candle from both ends, that their body isn't in a safe enough space to respond to ANYTHING we throw at it!

Health first. Always.

The Build Phase

The power of slow, consistent, realistic progress is massive. Millions of people start their fitness journey every year. Most of them fail. At least long-term.

Why?

Because they try to do too much, too fast, with too much pressure.

We've all seen the stats. But seeing doesn't always mean "believing". We all want to be the anomaly with this one.

Here's what Whitton and I did instead:

• increased her daily steps in 500-1k increments only when she'd confidently and consecutively hit her previous goal for 2 weeks

• slowly added fiber and protein to her diet using hand sized portions and F/P checklists so she wasn't focus on calories

• set up her environment so that the healthy choice became the easy choice: well-stocked fridge, cleaned out the junk food, placed a water bottle in every room, invested in some heavier weights

That was the bulk of her plan for the 1st 2-3 months. Once she felt comfortable with these new baselines, we started to dial things in:

• reducing added sugars from her diet

• switching to a mostly whole foods diet

• sneaking in a walk after meals

• solidifying a nightly routine

• practicing preventive stress management instead of reactive

How It's Going

Whitton has lost 38 pounds and is down 6% in body fat.

And we haven't even started a true fat loss phase yet!

5 Lessons Anyone Can Steal From This

Whitton's program has touched everything from her physical training, to her diet, to her mindset about fitness and her confidence in her body. We're looking at someone entering her #FitGirlEra, friends.

Here are 5 key takeaways:

I'm a firm believer in built-for-you programming. You're unique. Your body. Goals. History. Lifestyle. Genetics. So your plan and progress will be uniquely your own, too. But there are still some relevant nuggets that we can all take away from Whitton's journey.

Recognizing the difference between working out and training is an important step in realizing your potential.

Working out is what most people do: squeeze in a class, hop on the treadmill to sweat it out, follow a random YouTube video, and call it a day. It burns some calories, maybe clears your head, and you feel good for checking the box. There’s nothing wrong with that—but it keeps you in “maintenance mode.” It's not training.

Training is about developing a skill. A body. Training has purpose.

When you commit to training, every workout is part of a larger plan that’s designed for you—your goals, your lifestyle, your stress levels, your hormones, your season of life. The point is not just to move, but to progress strategically. You’re getting stronger, more resilient, more confident (not just sweaty), week after week.

The result: your first real push-up, a sense of power in your lifts and your body, improved aesthetics and body composition. Training asks more of you—it requires consistency, discomfort, and some honest self-audits—but it also gives more back.

Hard Does Not = STOP (there is a difference between hard and painful)

Modern life is full of gadgets and tools to make life easier. That's a great thing for mankind, but it leaves a giant gap between what we believe we can do, and what we actually can do. And that gap is "it's hard".

This is a realization that Whitton came to over the course of a few months. At first, her brain told her "this is too much, this is HARD -- stop!".

But her body wasn't in danger. Her comfort zone was being tested, and it was throwing a tantrum.

Hard is where the work actually starts. It’s your muscles being challenged, your mindset being stretched, your old stories about “I’m not an athletic person” getting called out.

When it gets hard, that’s your invitation to lean in, not tap out. That’s where strength, confidence, and real change are built—rep by rep, choice by choice.

*Pain is different. It's sharp, sudden, or persistent. It feels wrong, not just uncomfortable. Pain is your body saying, “Hey, something’s off here,” and that signal deserves respect. We don’t ignore pain, we adjust for it.

Discipline + Habit Lead to Motivation (not the other way around)

Discipline: doing what you said you were going to do, especially when you don’t feel like it.

Habit: a behavior you’ve repeated so many times it’s basically on autopilot.

Motivation: the feeling of wanting to take action.

Most people wait to feel motivated. But that's backwards thinking.

The most motivating reason to work out I can imagine is seeing results. Which means: you have to put in the work FIRST.

The goal in the beginning isn’t to be obsessed with lifting or wake up dying to go to the gym. The goal is to make it so simple and so doable that it would feel weird not to show up:

• Focused workouts

• A plan you don’t have to think about

• Clothes and shoes already out

• Calendar blocked.

The “I actually want to do this” feeling comes when your brain starts to trust that every workout gives you something back: better sleep, less stress, more confidence, clothes fitting great. You stack enough of those tiny wins and suddenly the gym isn’t this place of punishment—it’s the one hour that’s actually for you. That’s when you start to crave it.

Don’t wait around to magically want to work out. Show up, consistently, with a smart plan that respects your life and pushes you just enough. The want will catch up.

Mobility: The Unsung Hero of Next Level Results

After her fitness assessment, I recognized that mobility would be a sticking point for Whitton if not addressed.

We started with three, very targeted mobility sessions each week. Whitton was incredibly committed and the payoff has been huge. Not only is she 300% stronger today than she was a year ago, her squats are deeper, her Bulgarian split squat form is impressive and we've all but eliminated the pain she was experiencing in her elbow!

Mobility is the quiet MVP of your results. It’s not just “stretching” or doing a few half-hearted toe touches at the end of your workout. Mobility is your ability to move your joints through a full range of motion with control. It’s what lets you squat deeper without your back yelling at you, press overhead without your shoulders pinching, and lift heavier without feeling like a wobbly baby giraffe the next day.

When your mobility is solid, every rep is cleaner, safer, and more effective. You’re not fighting your own body just to get into position—you’re actually training the muscle you intend to train.

Changing How You Think About Food Is A Powerful Diet Strategy

When food is only labeled as “good” or “bad,” every meal becomes a test you’re either passing or failing. One glass of wine, one dessert, one chaotic day of takeout, and suddenly you’re “off the wagon,” so… why not just keep going, right?

That all-or-nothing mindset is the real problem, not the carbs or the chocolate. Food is a message to your body. Depending on the food, or the amount of food, that message is either "your safe: let's build!" or "we don't have what we need to function well, remain in emergency safety mode".

When you start seeing food as a message, as fuel, as a tool that supports your energy, strength, hormones, and mood, the whole game changes. You’re not a good or bad person based on what you ate today—you’re a scientist, gathering information and making tweaks.

This mindset shift is where long-term results actually come from.

• Not "is this allowed?" → but "is this what I need?"

• Not "how many calories is this?" → but "what nutrients do I get from this?"

• Not "gotta be perfect" → but "I can indulge with purpose and still take care of my body"

Some days that’s a high-protein, veggie-packed meal plan. Some days it’s simply enjoying the damn birthday cake without spiraling.

When food stops being a moral report card and becomes a strategic choice, you take your power back. You can eat in a way that supports fat loss, muscle, health and still have a life. That's something you can commit to long-term.

Want a next level plan built for you so that you too, can get next level results?

Join our community at The Transformation Club - or apply for 1:1 Coaching today!