Are you feeling lost in a sea of conflicting advice on nutrition, diet, and weight loss? I completely understand how overwhelming it can be to keep track of everything – from calorie counting to protein intake and figuring out exactly what a calorie deficit is all about. But don't worry, I'm here to help! With over 30 years of experience, I have all the expert advice you need to finally have the clarity you've been searching for about your diet. 

In this special "Ask Me Anything" episode, I'm addressing three brilliant questions about nutrition pulled directly from my community. Listen in for the truth about nutrition, diet, and weight loss that has worked for my clients for decades. And the best part? You can get started right now! It's never too late to start taking control of your health and creating the body you need to keep up with the life you love - whether you're in your 30s, your 70s, or beyond. 

Want FREE access to my brand new four-week strength training plan, Strength Without Stress? Head over to hollyperkins.com/review where you can upload a screenshot of your review and gain immediate access. This is a limited-time offer before it sells for $197, so be sure to grab it now!

Topics Covered:

• Does not eating enough actually prevent you from losing weight? 
• Why it’s almost impossible to know the number of calories you’re eating
• The 10 day rule 
• Macros versus calories for weight loss 
• Macronutrient distribution 
• Understanding your calories 
• Calorie expenditure 
• The amount of protein you should be eating
• Strategically picking foods based on their predominant macronutrient
• A formula for finding the ideal calorie range for your goals
• The role of carbs in your diet 

Resources Mentioned:

• Listen to the first 26 episodes of Holly Perkins Health Podcast HERE
• Listen to Episode 21: 5 Protein Mistakes You Might Be Making HERE
• Submit a question by DMing me on Instagram @hollyperkins HERE
• Join the waitlist for my Learn To Eat Workshop HERE

Follow Me: 

Find me on Instagram: @hollyperkins

Learn more on my website: hollyperkins.com

Connect with me on Facebook: facebook.com/HollyPerkinsFitness/

Disclaimer: Content and information as part of The Holly Perkins Health Podcast is for general interest, education, and entertainment purposes only. The use of information on this podcast or materials or products linked from this podcast or website is at the user’s own risk. The content of this podcast is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Users should not disregard or delay in obtaining medical advice for any medical or mental health condition they may have and should seek the assistance of their health care professionals for any such conditions.

Should you count grams of protein? Or should you focus on counting macros? Are you eating enough calories to lose weight? Or do you need to be in a calorie deficit? I'm answering these great questions and more in this episode. So keep listening. Hello, and welcome to a brand new episode of the holly Perkins health podcast. If you are new around here, hello, I'm your host, Holly Perkins. For 30 years, I have been helping women use strength training and intentional nutrition to become stronger, leaner, and empowered. Because I believe all you have is your health. And your body is your vehicle and life, right? When your body is strong and resilient, you're strong and resilient. When you feel good, you show up more and better for life. And for those that you love. I'll help you create the body that you need to keep up with the life that you love in your 40s 50s 60s 70s. And oh, yes, this is for you to even if you're in your 80s

If you feel completely confused by all of the information out there, I hope that this episode will help you calm the chaos, it is very overwhelming how much information is out there these days, I would say largely because of social media, we're in a very different landscape than we ever have been before. It's so easy to be so confused that you just give up trying to improve your health or improve your fitness or your body. Because really like what's the point, right? Tomorrow, there's going to be a new directive on strength training, or protein or caffeine or lectins and vegetables or sugar or alcohol, you catch my drift. Maybe you find yourself trying out an idea or a method that you heard about that your friend found success with. And then you find that you stick with it for seven to 10 days. But then if you don't get the results that you want, do you shift gears to another strategy? This is so common, and I hear it a lot in my practice, my friend, if this is you, this episode will help.

So in this episode, you'll hear three great questions from my community, specifically focused on nutrition, I get a lot of questions. And I was trying to decide exactly which ones to capture for this episode. And I decided, You know what, let's just focus on nutrition. And in a future episode, I'll do things more related to fitness or strength training. So every now and then I get some really good questions that I get probably a little too excited about. And I wanted to make sure that I shared them. So from time to time, you're going to get an episode like this one. That's a Ask Me Anything, type episode. And if you would like to submit a question for future episodes like this, please DM me on Instagram. My handle is at Holly Perkins, all lowercase, nothing else to it my first name and last name. So if you weren't feeling confused, I promise. It doesn't have to be this way. I promise. I promise in many ways. What I do can be simplified down quite a bit. And because there's so much information out there, it gets complicated, real easy. At the end of the day, I've found that most women are actually closer to their tipping point of sorts than they even realize you might be sitting there listening to this thinking, I am so far away, I have so much weight to lose, I'm so out of shape. And most of the time, you're actually really close to the precipice of going over to the other side where it's all downhill in the best way. Downhill in a good way in a progress sort of way. And most women just really need me to give them the direction, give them the instructions and keep them accountable so that they can stay on track long enough to get results. And most of the time, it's really pretty simple.

What I found is that if you'll stick with one methodology long enough, you'll most likely get some degree of results. Yes, some programs are better than others and some programs are flat out shady. I happen to think that mine are incredibly efficient at producing results. But you can get some results through a number of different avenues. And, for the most part, if you're following the advice from someone who's got some education and some experience, I actually believe that there's a good chance that will work provided it's designed for your life stage, your body and your goals. And that's very, very, very important. If you only knew how close you are to seeing progress and improvement, I know you'd stay the course. So some of this is just getting the right information, and then staying with it long enough so that you can get the results that you want. Most of the time, I get really simple, straightforward questions about building muscle, body composition and nutrition that every now and then I get these really unusual questions that are a bit more complex, but super relevant, and super, super helpful.

So today, you're getting three of the best questions that I've received probably in the past, I would say nine months to a year, these answers are from the hips spoken, just as I would tell these women directly if we spoke in person, or if you were in one of my coaching groups. So So let's jump in. And I will tell you exactly how I would answer these questions. So number one comes from Margo from Instagram. And her question is, is it actually possible that not eating enough can prevent you from losing weight? I've had two different personal trainers tell me that I'm thinking they're a little off. And they mean, because if you're quote unquote, not eating enough, then you're not getting enough protein to build muscle, which would help burn more fat? This is a loaded question. And it's actually kind of two questions in one.

So the first thing I want to answer directly is, is it actually possible that not eating enough can prevent you from losing weight? Because I do get this question on the regular and I feel the media is guilty of circulating this idea. So let me say this, okay. The PC answer is, could eating too little prevent you from losing weight? And on paper? The answer is yes. If you're not eating enough, there's a chance that your thyroid is going to down regulate, your metabolism is going to down regulate and you're not going to be a fat burning machine, your metabolism isn't going to be firing hot and burning, like we want it to. So the concept makes a lot of sense. But in my practice, which is now 30 years of coaching people and women, I can tell you this, honestly, and truly, I have never, ever once had a client who couldn't lose weight because they were under eating. It has never happened. I have never seen it happen. In fact, I'm thinking of a client I had way back in New York City when I was a baby. It happened to be a man, he was young, he was in his 20s. And he would come in for a five o'clock workout late in the day. And I'll say, Hey, what did you eat today? He's like, I'm a banana. And I'm like, you had a banana all day long. And he's like, Yeah, I don't eat most days. And the truth is, he was skinny as a rail. The times that I've worked with women where this is the case, they're usually pretty skinny. So my answer to the first part of this is, yeah, that makes sense. Conceptually, I think there are doctors that promote this idea. I think there are personal trainers that promote this idea, especially men. But as a woman, I've never seen that happen most of the time. If you were to come to me and say, Holly, I am eating so few calories, I'm eating eight or 900 calories a day and I'm not losing weight. Is it possible that I'm not eating enough? There's two things going on. Number one, it is almost impossible to really and truly know the number of calories that you're actually eating. If you are hunkered down in your house and you are cooking everything and putting it into your mouth and weighing not measuring, weighing every drop of everything that goes into your mouth. You're going to be close, but there still is a margin of error

because of nutrition reporting. You don't actually know what you're really eating. If you came to live with me and I fed you for two, three weeks, six weeks, whatever. And I gave you my calorie calculation. You're going to lose weight. Most of the time. If you're not losing weight. It's because you're cyclical total cow salaries are not in a deficit, what I see frequently is that women will be calorie restricted, let's say Monday to Thursday, or Monday to Friday at five o'clock. And then through the weekend, they're a little bit more relaxed with their eating, or they may not be aware of everything that they are eating. And at the end of the day, it's not about what you eat every 24 hours or 24 hours that you'll gain or lose weight, it's really cyclical.

And in my experience, I call this the 10 day rule, it takes about 10 days of pure consistency, to really see the change in your body from your strategy. So if you're eating X number of calories, you've got to do that consistently for a bare minimum of 10 days. Ideally, in the real world, it's more like 14 to 21 days, to see if it's actually accurate. If you believe that you are restricting your calories, if you are on a weight loss journey, first of all, please listen to all of the episodes on my podcast because I would like to reframe that. I feel that it's a losing battle pun intended. But if this is you, and you would say I'm on a weight loss journey, I'm restricting my calories. I believe I'm in a calorie deficit, I'm exercising even moderately. If you are not losing weight, you're not in a calorie deficit. And again, there's going to be some critic that is going to challenge me on this. And I know the research is there to support both sides of the conversation. But here's what I can tell you. I've been in this game for a long time. I've been coaching women for 30 years, I have a degree in exercise physiology and nutrition. I'm a Certified Strength and Conditioning Specialist. I have a lot of experience working with a lot of humans. And I can tell you this, I've never seen someone not lose weight, because they're not eating enough. Full stop.

Let's go on to the second part of that question, which Margo shared, I'm thinking they're a little off. And they mean that because if you're not eating enough, then you're probably not eating enough protein to build muscle, which would help burn more fat. And that's very sophisticated thinking, Margo. On the one hand, I would agree with that. Now, when you hear this quote from other people, that not eating enough can prevent you from losing weight, they pretty much mean that full stop calories in calories out. If you're not eating enough calories, you're not going to be burning enough calories is the concept. The other half of the equation is this protein thing. And it's true if you are legitimately eating less than 1000 calories a day, your protein is going to be low. But I don't think that is the issue. I think ultimately it comes down to physics, it comes down to mathematics, calories in and calories out really are is what dictates weight gain and weight loss. It's to some degree to some degree, your macronutrient distribution doesn't matter when it comes to weight loss and weight gain. So another question I got, I think it might be one of the next questions I can't remember. But we'll get there is that when it comes to weight loss, what's more important macros or calories and the truth is at the end of the day, the only thing that matters when it comes to weight loss and weight gain is calories because you could be eating in a calorie surplus and it could be 100% carbohydrates, it could be 100% protein. If you're in a calorie surplus for a long enough period of time, you're going to add body fat and vice versa. If you're in a calorie deficit for a long enough period of time, it doesn't matter if you're eating Snickers bars all day long. If you're in a calorie deficit, you will gobble up some muscle but you will lose weight either from muscle loss, fat loss or a combination of both. Alright my friend stay with me because in a moment, I'm going to talk a bit more about getting the right amount of protein and how to know if you're eating the right number of calories. But first

So this next question is somewhat related to the first question but quite different and I think it's relevant. more so because we are talking about alright then well, how many calories should you be eating and how much protein should you be eating? So this question comes from Denisa from my community, and Denisa says Hi Holly, I am really struggling with understanding how many calories I should be eating. Some say 1500 Some say 1700 And some say 1300 And then the macros girl I I'm so lost and all of this and I don't seem to be getting anywhere. I used to train years ago and had an injury and stopped. Recently, I've been back for three months doing weights now and not knowing how much to eat, or at what macros. I'm all over the place. I'm trying to lose weight. I'm 50 years old, and she gives me her height and her weight. And I am at about 32% body fat. I love carbs. But I want to understand how much of the complex carbs I should really be eating for weight loss to actually lose this fat around my stomach area. Can you help me please exclamation point crushed question Denisa I so feel your confusion. And like I said, this is related to the first question, but different.

First, let's talk about how many calories should you be eating? And how is it related to Macros. So again, as I just said, weight loss and weight gain really do come down to a calorie deficit or calorie surplus. And just to be clear, if this is newer for you, a calorie deficit means that you are expending more calories that you're taking in. Okay, energy out. And a calorie surplus means you're bringing in more calories than you're expending energy in energy out. It's physics, it's mathematics, you can't argue it. Now, what I will say is when it comes to fat loss, absolutely, you have to be in a calorie deficit, full stop. And, and and and we can optimize the process. By balancing out your macronutrients, we can make the process more comfortable, we can make the process more miserable. But ultimately, it comes down to the calories. Now, if you are eating the perfect macronutrient distribution, which we'll talk about in a moment, and you are keeping your blood sugar stable, those two things will help your body burn fat more efficiently. So therefore, it can make weight loss easier, it can certainly make it more comfortable. And I actually believe that if you are we're just talking about nutrition here, I'm not really even tapping into the power of building muscle and gaining weight through muscle gain.

Let that's a different conversation. But specifically around nutrition. I do believe it's possible to get a slight boost. When your macronutrients are balanced. Meaning what I have noticed is people are more comfortable at lower calorie amounts when their blood sugar is stable, because their macronutrients are balanced. I also believe that if you get into that process long enough, and your blood sugar is nice and stable, and you've got your macronutrients balanced and a smart strategy that ultimately you might be able to eat a little bit more each day and still be in a calorie deficit. To some degree. Now, we're only talking about maybe one or 200 calories, which really is negligible. At the end of the day, it comes down to calories Denisa if you're trying to lose weight, so how many should you be eating? And the answer really depends on your physical activity because calories in calories out the number of calories that you eat on a Sunday, if you're a couch potato watching movies all day is going to be different than a day when maybe you get up in the morning and you go for a walk. And then later in the day you go to the gym for a strength training session, your calories will be different. So in a perfect world, your calories each day are going to reflect your energy expenditure.

If your days are filled with a lot of movement, let's say if your job requires you to run around all day, versus if your job requires that you sit all day, that's going to change your calorie expenditure. I say this because it's a bit of a sliding scale. I'm going to give you how I estimate calories within my community. I have found it to be incredibly effective, incredibly, shockingly accurate. And where a coaching program really excels is in giving you these numbers, but also helping you tweak those numbers to your specific energy expenditure each day. So a rough way To determine where your calories should be, that I have found, again, in my 30 years of practice, that works based on the proof that I have with my clients. And what I see in my practice is very simple. Take your current body weight, and you're going to multiply it by a multiplier based on what your goal is. So Denisa, if your goal is to lose weight, you're going to take your current body weight, and you're going to multiply it by the number nine, the number 10. And then number 11, that's gonna give you three numbers. Those numbers reflect your calorie range based on how active you are. bodyweight times nine is for those of you listening, who aren't super active, who aren't strength training, or who don't exercise a lot and have a sedentary lifestyle. bodyweight times 11 is for those of you who are more active, who do burn more calories each day, who are strength training and who are really

actively exercising to lose weight. So it's a range as you can see, and for weight loss, I have found that nine to 11 is really the sweet spot to get started. Give it a number of weeks to at a minimum to get some feedback. Obviously, you have to be accurately tracking your calories. You don't have to be super calorie conscious down to the calorie, but you do have to be within a margin of about one to 200 calories per day to get some feedback if it's working or not. If it's not working, subtract 100 calories, wait two weeks and see what happens. If it's stiff, you're still not losing weight, subtract another 100 calories and wait two weeks and get some feedback. It works. Every time I see this in my practice, and this is my approach. The second part of Denise's question touches upon this macronutrient distribution. And as Denise said, Is it calories or is it macros girl?

Let me pause for a moment in case you're newer to this conversation. When I refer to macros or macronutrient balancing what I'm talking about is strategically choosing the foods that you eat based on their predominant macronutrient. For example, chicken breast is predominantly protein. Olive oil is predominantly fat, a banana is predominantly carbohydrate. So all the foods that you eat in a given day can be categorized based on their dominant macronutrient. There are some foods where it's a little confusing, like beans, nuts and eggs and some other foods that do contain protein. But we always want to categorize the foods based on their predominant macronutrient. Eating according to Macros, or macronutrient balancing as I like to refer to it means that you pick and choose those foods so that at the end of the day, you're achieving a certain macronutrient distribution structure. And out there in the field. Many of us experts have different philosophies around the quote unquote, perfect macronutrient distribution, there is a time and a place for different macronutrient distributions, for sure. But what I have found is there kind of is a sweet spot that works for everyone.

Now, if you're trying to get ripped for a photo shoot in two weeks different conversation, if you are wanting to eat in a sustainable way in a realistic way without eliminating food groups. And if you're wanting to eat to stabilize your blood sugar, which you should, by the way, because it's the panacea. Balancing your macronutrients, according to a certain distribution works best, because it really helps your body to be stable, and to stabilize your blood sugar levels. When your blood sugar levels are stable, you're going to burn fat efficiently and optimally. And when you do that, you're going to be burning calories more optimally. It makes you feel better. It helps to improve body composition. It staves off muscle loss and atrophy. And oh by the way, it's the best distribution for helping you comfortably lose body fat. So again, everyone has a different opinion out there. I firmly believe based on the research that the sweet spot for a macro nutrient distribution is somewhere between 40% carbs and 50% carbs each day. I tend to prescribe something between 4030 30 and 5025 25. If you are strength training, if you are active, if you're wanting to build muscle, my default distribution is a 5025 25 breakdown 50% of your daily calories are coming from carbohydrates, 25% of your daily calories are coming from protein. And that last number 25% of your daily calories are coming from fat. That is what we're referring to when we talk about eating according to Macros, or macronutrient distribution. And let me tell you, it is magic. When you get this right. This is why I'm a proponent of eating this way, and only eating this way. And I'm also a proponent of getting more carbohydrates in relation to the protein that you're eating.

Now, this is a beautiful segue into the next question, from Michelle. I know I need to eat more protein, but I've heard that it can make you fat. If you eat too much. I keep seeing one gram of protein per pound of body weight. Is that right? But I know you teach macros, then I heard a trainer say that you'll never eat too much protein and that it burns fat. Help, please, again, a lot of confusion around this conversation. And ultimately, at the end of the day, as I said from question number one calories do matter. If you are eating too many calories than your body actually needs in a given day for energy balance. Even if all of those calories are coming from protein, you are going to gain body fat. If you're bringing in more energy no matter what the form is more than you're expending. Yes, you could build some muscle for sure. But you're also going to gain body fat to the degree of your calorie surplus. So you can eat too much protein. And of course, you can eat too little protein. So yes, you can sit down with your body weight. And you can calculate I did an episode on this. You can calculate based on your body weight in pounds or kilograms, how much protein you should be eating. And I think that that is a good exercise for sure. Sit down with your current bodyweight. Listen to my episode on how much protein you need. Calculate it out just so you kind of know because in my experience, one gram of protein per pound of bodyweight, for most women is a little more than they actually need. Most women don't quite need that much.

Now, is it a problem if you're eating a little too much protein not at all, not a problem at all. And I will tell you, I find it easier, more streamlined, more straightforward and more effective to overlook that approach. And again, just use a macronutrient distribution. If you're eating anything above 1400 calories, which most people do, I rarely program my clients below 1400 calories, unless I suspect that they're not reporting accurately, and then I will have them try to eat less. But chances are you're eating at a bare minimum of 1400 calories most people most women in my experience will lose weight at 1400 calories provided your strength training is in place. And that all of the pieces of the puzzle come together. So your macronutrients, the types of foods that you're eating to meet that macronutrient distribution, how much cardio you're doing, the nature of the cardio that you're doing, how many steps how much you're sleeping, there are a lot of factors that determine exactly how many calories you need. But for the most part, if I had to slap a generic number on women that first start working with me, it would be around 1400 calories. And then we can use the signs and symptoms of weight loss to tweak those calories upwards or downwards after we get feedback from about two weeks. So ultimately, at the end of the day, I find it's just easier to take, like I said your current bodyweight, multiply it by a multiplier based on what your goal is.

Now, if you remember, Michelle didn't mention weight loss. She just wants to make sure that she's getting enough protein. She also doesn't want to gain weight from eating too much and she doesn't want to lose weight from eating too little. She wants to eat for optimal protein intake and to be healthy. And so here the goal is the little different, if your goal is to have more energy, to feel better to have great workouts to crush your workouts, and to maintain where your body weight is, and potentially improve your body composition, I have found that taking your current body weight times the multipliers 1112 and 13 will give you a calorie range that is perfect for this goal. When you run that exercise, and you take your current bodyweight, multiplied it by 1112, and 13, you can then back out of that to take a look at how much protein you should be eating each day. Every single time I've done this, it almost matches up exactly to body weight times 1.4 1.2 or 1.6 per kilogram of body weight to come up with your protein. So it's just easier to do it this way. But it also helps to guide how many carbohydrates you should eat, and how much fat you should eats.

So one of the problems that I see when people are simply calculating their protein based on their body weight, and then structuring their whole day around just getting their grams of protein per day, is that a lot of times their macronutrient distribution will be balanced. So for example, if you say, okay, my goal is to eat one gram of protein per pound of body weight, and you weigh 150 pounds, that means you would be eating 150 grams of protein per day, you go off on your day, and you eat your foods of protein, and you hit that 150 grams of protein, but you're not paying attention to fat and carbohydrates. And if you're not paying attention to calories, it's very easy that at the end of the day, fat is your predominant macronutrient even if you are hitting your protein goal. So if you're not picking and choosing the foods that you eat, to land at a specific macronutrient distribution, if you're just focusing on calories, or if you're just focusing on protein, there's a really good chance fat is your predominant macronutrient at the end of the day. Is there a problem with that? Not if you're trying to lose weight, there's not a problem with it. Because again, if you're trying to lose weight, it's really only about the calories. Okay? And if you're trying to gain weight, it's really only about the calories. But when fat is your predominant macronutrient and you're simply trying to achieve a protein goal. This means that your carbohydrates are coming in dead last. That means you're eating the least amount of carbohydrates when compared to protein and fat. Now you might be sitting there thinking, Well, yeah, that's a low carb lifestyle. Exactly. That's what we're supposed to do to burn fat and lose weight. Because we have been indoctrinated to believe this since the 90s. If you can believe that, since the 90s. Actually, I think it goes back to the 70s. With the Atkins diet.

The truth is, again, in my experience, and there's a lot of research to support this, that when fat or protein is your predominant macronutrient at the end of the day, you're actually not going to feel as well, and you're not going to burn calories or fat, or burn muscle as efficiently as possible. Guess what? You need carbs, to release body fat and you need carbs to build muscle just as much as you need protein to build muscle. Building muscle isn't only reflective of your protein intake. It's really reflective of your strength training, that if you want to back up your smart strength training program with the right nutrition. It's protein and carbs. So when clients come to me, and they haven't been watching their macronutrient distribution, and then we go through a system of tracking, most of the time, fat is the predominant macronutrient I can take the client at the same exact number of calories and redistribute their macronutrients so that they get to eat more carbs. And guess what happens? Their energy goes up. Their food cravings go down. Their appetite goes down. And then guess what happens? They burn fat, so much easier, faster and more comfortably. So there's a big argument for getting your macronutrients balanced for overall health, energy, mood, muscle building, and fat loss.

So to summarize, and to answer Michelle's question more directly, it's really easiest to calculate out the calories that you need for your goal each day, based on your goal and your current body weight. And then that's going to inform you how much protein you eat. To me, it's like a security blanket. If you get your calories right, and you eat anywhere between a 4030 30 distribution and a 5025 25 distribution, you're going to be assured that you're going to get the bare minimum, and maybe even the optimal amount of protein to maximize all those benefits of protein, whether it's building muscle, or just health in general. As I said, at the top of the episode, this could sound complicated and complex, but most of the time, it's pretty simple. And you are probably closer to that precipice of tipping into the land of progress than you realize. So one step at a time, calculate out your macronutrients, as per your goal and your body weight, and you're going to be headed in the right direction. I hope that you found value from these great questions today. And listen, changing your body does require effort, focus, strategy, consistency, and time. But when those things are in the mix, and they're right for your goals, it's really just about staying the course. And then tweaking your program variables every two weeks to maximize your results, then all you got to do is just keep going. And if you can do that, you might even amaze yourself. If you're interested to dive even deeper in some of the topics that we talked about today, I'm going to be offering a brand new three day live workshop next month and you can get on the waitlist now just to be notified of when that workshop is going to happen. It's totally free. It's one of the best things that I do all year long. And it's an opportunity for you to really learn a little bit more about what I teach around nutrition so that you can reduce hunger, reduce cravings, boost energy and get better results from your strength training program. Just come over to my website Holly perkins.com forward slash workshop. Put your name on the waitlist. That simply means I'll notify you first when that workshop is live. And stay tuned for another brand new episode on Tuesday of next week. Stay strong my friend