Vendor Highlights: Katrina Forrest

Recently we featured a favorite JP, and now we want to feature a health and life coach who we is a great resource for all those brides concerned about how they will look and feel on their wedding day. She's a great source of holistic and healthy inspiration! Below is a piece she wrote just for us!

Wedding Weight & Beyond!

Katrina Forrest

www.klfhealthcoach.com

Are you in a panic realizing that you need to start losing weight for your wedding? Are you focused on that one day, or the rest of your life? So many brides focus on looking thin and perfect for just one day and spend months in constant anxiety employing crash diets and punishing workouts to lose weight. By the time the wedding day comes, brides are frazzled and exhausted. When the big day has passed, the weight comes back like a freight train out of control. Losing weight should not be about how you look, it is about how you feel!

Here are 5 strategies that I work with clients with for losing weight for your big day and keeping it off forever.

1) Get rid of Deadlines. They create WAY too much stress. Stress creates discomfort in our minds and bodies. When we have discomfort, we search for ways of relief. And the easiest relief is rich, salty, sugary foods. Sound familiar? Lose the deadline and shift your focus on how to feel good everyday. Set mini goals each week; like starting each morning with a healthy breakfast or get to bed 20 minutes earlier each night. Not only will you have a happier engagement, but you will be creating habits you can carry with you long after the wedding.

2) Exercise to relieve stress or just have some fun. Find exercise that you love to do and schedule it in among the dress fittings and spa appointments. Make a date with your fiancé to go for a walk to reconnect. Promise him you will not talk about wedding stuff and just enjoy each other’s company. Try a Zumba class and learn some new moves for the wedding day. Need a challenge or never worked out before? Join a local fitness facility or hire a personal trainer to get you set up with a program that works best for you.

3) Eat a daily balanced diet. Do not cut out entire food groups or starve yourself. Your body needs carbohydrates, proteins and healthy fats. Eat fruits and unlimited veggies to give you sustained energy. Give into your cravings, but choose healthier options. Want burgers and fries? Make them at home with whole, fresh foods. Use organic, lean ground beef, sprouted grain muffins and make your own sweet potato fires. Start your morning off with a balanced breakfast. Try a veggie frittata with a piece of whole grain toast or a quick fruit and veggie smoothie. Here are a few recipes to inspire you:

http://katrina-forrest.healthcoach.integrativenutrition.com/recipes

4) Planning is the key to a healthy lifestyle. Think about all the planning that you are putting into your wedding day and honeymoon. Focus some of that energy to scheduling in workouts, prepping and trying new recipes and taking some down time for yourself and fiancé. Take a few minutes at the end of each day to prepare for the next day. Before you know it, this will be a new, healthy habit forever.

5) Ask for HELP! Stress levels are already high. Don’t try and do it all on your own and let your health and sanity suffer. If you are feeling overwhelmed, ask for help. Hire a wedding planning to help with wedding day details. Ask your fiancé to help out more around the house or have someone clean your house a few times a month. Work with a health coach to help you set small, realistic and attainable goals.

It is very easy to get caught up in how tight you want your arms to be or how you will look in your bikini on your honeymoon, but being so focused on the outside can actually prevent you from losing weight. You must create change from the inside out. This starts with having a very clear understanding about how you want to feel in your body on your wedding day- not just how you want to look.

Take some quiet time to picture your wedding day. How do you want to feel just before you walk down the isle? Picture your friends’ and families’ heads slowly turning to look at you. What do their faces look like? What you see in them should be a perfect reflection of how you feel. Practice this whenever you get a chance, and your body will naturally gravitate towards this state. All of the healthy habits you are creating will fall into place with far less friction.

Your engagement and wedding day should be one of the most exciting times in your life. Embrace this amazing opportunity to build a lifestyle and create a healthy body that you have always dreamed of.