Do you suffer from an ‘all or nothing” mentality, especially when it comes to your health?
Are you a momma to a fresh little newborn struggling with the way your body has changed?
Wouldn’t it be nice to have some baby steps we can easily take towards better body stewardship as mothers?
In this episode Sasha chats with Kristen Noriega. Kristen is a registered dietitian, military spouse, work-from-home mother of 4, and host of the Baby Weight Nutritionist podcast. As the Baby Weight Nutritionist, her mission is to empower other busy moms of littles to live their best life NOW-–not when the kids go to school or move out of the house. Kristen believes there’s no need to wait to start living the fullest, healthiest life that God designed for us moms!
Kristen starts by sharing her testimony of feeling down about her body after her first baby and having to break free from diet culture in order to step into a healthy family culture instead. She shares tips how busy moms can simplify being better stewards of our health.
First and foremost Kristen starts with ditching the “all or nothing” mindset and instead implementing the messy middle and taking baby steps in our health. She continues by sharing examples of quick and easy ways we can easily move our bodies and exercise involving our families. Kristen reminds us how much discipleship and educating our children in health & life, is caught not taught. She leaves us with the peace that holding our babies during that fourth trimester is more than okay, it’s about taking baby steps forward when we’re ready.
Want to connect with Kristen?
Website: https://kristennorieganutrition.com/
Facebook: http://facebook.com/groups/babyweightsupport
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/babyweight.nutritionist
Podcast: https://www.bit.ly/babyweightnutritionist
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Scriptures Referenced
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Transcription
Kristen is a registered dietitian. A military spouse. Whoo. Thank you for your service and a work from home mother of four. She is host of the baby weight nutritionist podcast and as the baby weight nutritionist. Her mission is to empower busy moms of Littles to live their best life. Now, not when the kids go to school or when the kids move out of the house, she says, There is no need to start. There’s no need to. Wait, start living the fullest healthiest life that God has designed us for. So, thank you, Kristen, so much for being here. We were just chatting before we hit record and I found out you are tuning in from Germany today. Wow, amazing. That is like, certainly my favorite country in the world.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Well, thanks for having me, Sasha. I’m excited to be here. Got my kids in bed and I’m ready to go.
Sasha Robertson: Awesome. I’m so glad we found a time that that works from almost other parts of like, opposite parts of the world. So, um, Kristen, I know, with all this information that you have about health and just about motherhood in general, right? Being a mom of four, you’re busy, mom yourself with a podcast and business and so much more, you know what? It’s like to be a busy mom, but you also have so much value and information to share and how to simplify nutrition and health for us, busy Mom. So, I would love to hear all the things. Like, as a mom of Littles, what was all of that like for you? And maybe you can give us a little bit of testimony. And also tips that we can take better control and better stewardship of our health and nutrition.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Yeah, so I think one of the best places for us to start off with is my story. So my my teenage years and college years, I was healthy, you know, I was been active and way deep in diet culture. So that looked like trying to eat less and over exercising to compensate and you know, worrying about my weight in the clothes fitting into just like all of us. And then I became a mom and My husband deployed, I became it. I was finishing up. My internship to become a dietitian that year. it was winter, my son was eight months old, and I just remember looking down and feeling like
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: What is wrong? Something’s gotta be wrong. I don’t feel good in my body at that things. I learned in school. They’re not working. I don’t like calorie count this. I was just frustrated. And so it took me. I just had to go through this process of unlearning. What I have learned in school regarding or maybe learned in life regarding diet, culture, and county and restriction. And I had a really dive into the food. Freedom side of things. I had to go through this process after my second son as well. And just and…
Sasha Robertson: If?
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: we second son, second deployment, second, third duty station, and if postpartum depression, that was undiagnosed and hindsight like, I’m like, Oh my gosh. I didn’t get help good grief, and just through both of those pregnancies and both of those babies, I really had to figure out that
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: I had to do it a different way, doing it. The way I used to just wasn’t gonna work and it looks different when I had little ones to feed, you know, never seen and feeding them like eating a meal with them at the same table and it was just it was different. And so yeah, it was quite a journey and then I realized I could help other women do the same. So enter my third baby and fourth baby and I haven’t, you know, there’s no more dieting, there’s no more, anything like that, and I help other women. Now figure out how to do that. So, lose weight, feel good in your body, do it without dieting, and do it in a way that creates a healthy family culture. So there’s my story.
Sasha Robertson: I love it and I think it’s really it relates to a lot of people like I think even myself you know I found myself just a few months into motherhood via adoption right? So I didn’t go through all of these hormonal changes and you know gaining weight and and really like the postpartum and all the stress that it puts on your body. But I still found myself sitting there, you know, for maybe three months, four months straight just holding a baby and cuddling, a baby and you know, I couldn’t go to the gym because I didn’t have a babysitter and the baby was too young to go to the daycare. And and so it was just really, really found my my health dwindling as I just sat there and cuddled the baby for this season but I still found myself in that situation where it’s like, Wow, I I’m just exhausted and I don’t feel great about myself. I don’t feel like I look good in my body and so much more. So I love that you shared that and then you found a way to yes. And and now you’re like, I can take all of my
00:05:00
Sasha Robertson: Notes and everything that I have through my own personal experience, plus what I’ve learned and help others. So super powerful, Now, I just have to know how can you tell us how? How can we go about being better? Stewards of our health? Just in general, especially as busy moms, like, Where do we find the time? How do we simplify it?
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Right, all the things. So when we’re trying to do all of the things when we want to hit every everything you know we want to have the perfect diet and we have meal plan and we want to hit the gym. I wanted exercise for 60 minutes a day. All of the things.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Then none of the things happen. So we’re when we’re faced with the decision between all or nothing. Just being human, we tend to fall back down towards nothing. So instead of finding like trying to achieve perfection and trying to accomplish everything, we really got to just find our messy middle so we don’t want to stay stuck at nothing. We want to just take these baby steps forward until we are feeling really good in that messy middle and that messy middles gonna look like making the next best choice. Whatever that is. That’s gonna look like drinking more water. Eating some more of the foods that, you know, are healthy just a little bit at a time. So taking the next best choice. The next best step one foot in front of the other. So for food that you know like you can just look at the next snack that you’re gonna eat, what could that be? And snacks are okay. You guys have permission to eat snacks that the whole different conversation but you
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Permission to fuel your body. You can eat really good nutrition and feel so much better than when you’re trying to. Eat very little and not taking care of yourself. So make the next best decision at that. Your next snack today literally go take this action. Step you’re gonna snack or your next meal. Add something that is super nutritious.
Sasha Robertson: I love that. I had a health coach before. And so I’m a huge advocate if you are looking to improve your health. Find a coach like whether that’s Kristen or whether it’s another one of the health coaches that I’ve hosted on here, like Find your person and have them walk with you. I remember a health coach and I was talking to her and I’m like, I’m a snacker, like, I could almost not eat like full meals because I could just snack all day. And she’s like, Okay, well, your snacks need to be You know, just make healthier choices and we agreed upon one snack, a day was going to be veggies.
Sasha Robertson: So just straight veggies if I needed ranch or something to go with them. But one snack a day veggies and wow, that teeny tiny step to do that one little thing every day, helped my health so much because there were days. I was just like I realized I was craving veggies because I didn’t have my veggie snack yet that day. And so it’s just crazy how those teeny tiny steps can create such a big difference in your life. And so I love that find your messy middle. That is so empowering and motivating. Like, I don’t have to do all the things. I don’t have to like, create this crazy regimen in the gym and like, hit all of my macros and do all the things. Let’s just find one simple baby step and the next choice that we’re gonna make and make it simple. That’s huge. That is so huge and freeing. So thank you. Anything else you have for us?
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Oh my gosh. Yes, all the things. So let’s see if. So we gave I gave you a food example. But let’s talk about exercise because you laid this out so. Well you have a little baby on your chest and you don’t want to go to the gym and they’re not accepting the kid and Post covid, some gyms like don’t even have childcare now, like, get with the program. It’s 2023. But it’s, you know, they still don’t have a special, I’m military bases. And so, as you’re looking at exercise, and you’re thinking just impossible, it’s just not gonna happen. That’s not true. Let’s break it down into smaller chunks. You don’t have to work out for 45 minutes. You don’t have to work out for 30 minutes. We’re gonna find little tiny pockets. Throughout the day, you can work out for five minutes.
00:10:00
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Three times a day and you just nailed 15 minutes or you can do you know so many different ideas for so many different activities like you can go to the park with your kids and you can play tag or you can do squats every time. You push your daughter on the swing or if you have a, it’s snowing outside. You can’t get out, have a dance party in your room, and you’re living room.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Or gosh. There’s so like, as you’re picking up the toys, because we know that our kids have our houses wrecked every single day, with what, how many toys, how many things are on the floor. Look around right now where you are. Can you see 30 things on the floor? That could be 30 burpees to get down, grab the item and get up. And if you’re like, Oh my God burpees, I can’t do burpees. That’s fine, do a squat, touch your toes, do something till it, becomes a habit and you just keep moving forward. How does that sit with you as far as exercise?
Sasha Robertson: Wow.
Sasha Robertson: That’s great. I love it because I’m a huge advocate. And y’all have heard me say here before, like, whatever. If you can, if it takes five minutes or less to do something, do it now, don’t procrastinate, don’t put it off. Don’t wait. And I had another guess in the podcast, who was talking about social media, right? And we always like compulsively checking social media in those five minutes a day while the pastas boiling, you know, while the kids are in the bath, when we wake up, when we go to the bathroom, before we go to sleep, and if if you think about that. But instead you take those five minutes and do some squats or do some jumping jacks. Do some crunches leg love. So ever do something simple like that can add up and compound so much and then I love what you were talking about like playing with your kids. That’s another healthy habit that I had implemented was two of my days that I’m gonna be active throughout the week is with my family. So that’s going to the pool and swimming together, that’s going for
Sasha Robertson: Walk around our neighborhood that’s doing the dance parties in the living room or going sledding, or just something fun as a family, I think it really shifts the mindset from I have to work out, I have to go to the gym, to, like, I get to go play with my kids, and that’s so fun,…
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Yeah.
Sasha Robertson: and it’s building relationship and connection. And so, so much goodness there, I love love it.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Yeah, but
Sasha Robertson: And I love that you even said, like, Just the find the tiny pockets throughout the day. That’s so huge. There’s so much that can happen in those tiny pockets.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Yeah, for sure, into give you even two more points to go off of for exercise one. There are many, many studies that show, that smaller bouts of exercise frequently throughout the day, which is an active lifestyle is more effective than one and done. So you’re doing yourself a favor by the finding the little pockets. And then the second thing is, you’re doing yourself a favor by showing your kids that it’s normal to move your body by teaching them that this is just what we do. We get up, we go on walks, we play, we run hard. We we play tag till we can’t any longer. That is what we do in our family, and you are setting them up just for so much more.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Success in the health department because if you know, whatever they see you do, that’s what they want to do. What they see you eating fruits and vegetables. Let’s do it together. If they see you eating, you know, enjoying sweets without guilt and incorporating it into a part of your diet, just diet. I mean, like the normal foods you’re eating and just normalizing these things. Then they’re going to know that food is okay, movement is okay, and that’s how you create your healthy family culture.
Sasha Robertson: Yes. So much goodness. I love that you pointed out how much it’s caught not taught. It’s so so powerful and so true that our kids want to do what we’re doing. They see what we’re doing. They see that it’s good and it works, especially if it’s a place where it’s building connection you know with them and it goes so far, Kristen, I feel like we could talk forever about this. I want to ask you so much more questions and I’m sure the listeners do too. But for the sake of time today, where can people find you and connect with you that want to ask more questions and learn more about what you have to share in terms of all of this health and nutrition and so much more for busy moms.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Yeah. So you can start with my podcast, the daily nutritionist, right? Where you found this one, you’ll find mine there and if you want to, you can go on to Instagram and find me at babyweight.nutritionist and shoot me, a DM, like I’m legit in my dms, talking to women all day long, talking about this stuff. And when you have someone who really truly cares, what you have to say about your body and the struggle you’ve been going through, it feels really good, so go talk to me, shoot me a DM.
00:15:00
Sasha Robertson: Awesome. I love it and friends. I will be dropping those links in the show notes, Kristen if there was any person who’s like, Yeah, I hear you talking about health, but It’s just, you know, while my babies are little. I want to sit here and hold them and or I just don’t have the energy. I don’t have the time or whatever, are some common things that you see, pop up with women who come into your circle and it’s like, Yeah, I want to prioritize health, but I just don’t even know where to start. What words of encouragement would you share with them?
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: I would say that if you have a brand brand new baby and you’re in that fourth trimester, girl, do yourself a favor and sit and snuggle your baby and it’s gonna be fine. But when you get past that, once you start to move, once you start to make a tiny little change, it’s gonna compound and the energy comes back and they motivation comes back, it all works together. You’re not just gonna get up and say, I’m gonna go run a marathon. You have to start with running to the corner running around the block, and then it starts to feel good. And then you can do more and more, but you can’t run that marathon right off the bat. So take baby steps. And your energy will come back, your motivation will come back. Your health will come back and you’re gonna feel better.
Sasha Robertson: I love it. Don’t run a marathon today. And they give you yes and…
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Please don’t.
Sasha Robertson: they give yourself grace at the beginning. I love that too. And cuddle, those babies when they’re tiny. Yes, but but be willing to make those baby steps when the time is, right. And you’ll know, I think when your heart is calling to, to get up and move and to make those changes. And so, thank you so much. Kristen for being here. I am fired up and motivated to go move with my family today. So thank you for your encouragement and God bless you. And God bless all the listeners.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Thanks Sasha. Bye.
Sasha Robertson: Yay. Okay. That was my first recording on Google meets so I hope I hope it works out well.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: It looks like you can download the transcripts. You should try that. Have you seen that?
Sasha Robertson: I did. So, when I record on Google Meets, I told it to like, transcribe also, and so once we end it just shows up in my Google Drive I’ve not done it with like another person on here,…
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Pipe.
Sasha Robertson: but I’ve recorded my own videos on here and like, that’s so cool.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Oh my gosh.
Sasha Robertson: Somebody told me you can do it on, zoom, too, but I’ve never found the feature to be able to do it on zoom. So,
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Do you have blogs? Because that would be so useful.
Sasha Robertson: I do.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Holy Cow.
Sasha Robertson: Yeah. And I actually was paying someone to like manually transcribe my podcast. Like they would do it with Otter ai, and then edit and…
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Yeah.
Sasha Robertson: I was paying them so much of their time. And so then I started doing it through Podbean and it’s cheap, it’s like three dollars or something, you know, sometimes for an episode but if I don’t have to pay for it and I can just download this, that’s way better. yeah, I have,…
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: That’s cool. Do you? And you should pay for Google me, like the Google Suite, don’t you, I don’t have it.
Sasha Robertson: I have the workspace and so it’s included with Google Workspace and…
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Works. Okay.
Sasha Robertson: I have that for the email And so I was like well I don’t have to pay the hundred and something dollars for zoom anymore, then that would be great. So thank you for your flexibility and…
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: holy, holy,
Sasha Robertson: willing to jump on here because It was good.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: In the marriages changed, Maya my work model.
Sasha Robertson: Right. I was asking, I don’t, I don’t know where we connected, but I’m in a few different podcast groups. Stephanie Gass is one of them and and I was asking in her group and…
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Yes.
Sasha Robertson: not a lot of people use it, but then one person said that they did and they love it and I’m like, okay, well I’m gonna try it. and, So far. I like it. So we’ll see.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Yeah. Have you gone all the way through P2P?
Sasha Robertson: No, I start in April.
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Oh, good. Cool. I did the April group last year. Yeah. Should be.
Sasha Robertson: Okay. Did you love it?
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Good. I did. It was good. Yeah. It was helpful for sure.
Sasha Robertson: Yeah. I’m super excited. I’ve done all the other stuff and…
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Yeah.
Sasha Robertson: I’ve gotten to one-on-one calls with stuff before and they’ve both been like, super transformational, like already. My podcast is blown out of the water. What I could have expected or even hoped for, and so, I’m really excited for PTP
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Good. It’s gonna be so good for you. That’s awesome.
Sasha Robertson: Yay. Well Kristen, thank you so much for your time and I appreciate everything that you had to share. I will send you an email with the link in a graphic once it’s live. Awesome. Thank you.
00:20:00
Kristen Noriega, MS, RDN, LD: Perfect. Alright. See ya. Bye.
Sasha Robertson: God bless.
More about your Podcast Host
Your Host, Sasha Star Robertson is an Intentional Living & Biblical Mindset Coach for busy Christian moms, wife of 14 years to her best friend, boy mom x2 (blessed by adoption), travel addict, and Jesus freak. She is the founder of The Intentional Abundance Co., curator of the Life & Goals Planner, host of the Intentional MomLife with Jesus Podcast & co-host of the Faithful Family Fortress Podcast. Sasha is passionate about the call in Isaiah 61:1-2 and believes that God called her to set mothers free from the stress, overwhelm, and burden associated with modern day motherhood and instead help them live in the freedom of Christ through Biblical mindset & balanced schedules..
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