The Melina Method, Episode 7: Fat Loss That Actually Works — The Melina Method Breakdown

If you feel like you’re doing everything right—but your body still isn’t changing… this episode is for you.
Because fat loss isn’t just about eating less and working out more. If your metabolism, hormones, recovery, and daily habits aren’t aligned… your body will NOT respond the way you want it to.
In this episode of The Melina Method Podcast, I’m breaking down the real reason most women stay stuck—and exactly how to fix it.
We’re talking:
    •    Why your body might be holding onto fat (even when you’re “on track”)
    •    The biggest mistakes I see with fat loss
    •    How to actually get your metabolism working FOR you
    •    The foundation you NEED before adding anything advanced
    •    Where strategic tools (like peptides) can support results when done right
This is about getting out of frustration mode and into RESULTS mode.

If your body isn’t changing, something in your system is off— reach out to Melina to get dialed in! 

themelinafitness@gmail.com 

Tune in now on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts + The McCord List TV 

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Hi guys, I'm Melina, and for 23 years, I literally can't believe I'm saying that. I've been helping women get unstuck and feel healthy, fit, and confident in their own skin. This is the Melina Method Podcast, where nutrition meets mindset, fitness gets unraveled to be your superpower, and we really dive in to see the real you for who you are. Hey, hey, you guys. Do you love my new studio? New studio, new episode. Who are we? Today is a very popular topic. I feel like it's a topic that will never get old. I feel like it's a topic that has been around since um, I don't even know, like the beginning of time. Like, let's just talk about it. Let's get into it. The truth about fat loss. How many of you have so many questions about fat loss? Like, I mean, I feel like as we age, as we grow, as we shift, I love using that word. You guys know that. Fat loss is something that constantly changes and evolves. And with the times, like new things come out to help with our fat loss. I remember growing up, like everybody was on a fat-free diet. Like my mom was like the fat-free diet, the diet coke. It was like fat-free, fat-free, fat-free, everything. And then, like in the 90s, like I I think that went on the broccoli and hot dog diet. Like, I mean, there were so many things that people will do to target fat loss. And little did we know, like, they're doing it all wrong, right? So one of the most popular things, and I have some notes here. So if you see me look down, that's that's what I'm looking at. Um, I don't want to miss a beat. And this could be a super long episode, and I'm sure I'm gonna have this topic come up again. We're gonna talk about it again. But the main thing I want to talk about is kind of what's evolved with fat loss and why you kind of feel like maybe you're doing everything right and you're not seeing results. I think that's like probably one of the most popular things. Like people feel like they're doing everything right, but then they're stuck and they're not seeing any results when it comes to fat loss. Or maybe like they lose four pounds or three pounds and then they like gain it back, right? It's like this yo-yo thing. So I really want to cut through the BS. I really want to just cut through it all and just be really real with you about things that I really want you to grasp from this episode about the truth about fat loss. Maybe no one really is saying, or maybe they are. I mean, there's so many people on Instagram, social media. Uh I mean, there's a lot of content out there. Like, let's be real. And here I am with another episode and another social media post about fat loss. But I've been doing this for 23 years, you guys. I've been in the health and fitness space 24. I mean, I let me age myself a little bit. 24 years. I'm certified sports nutritionist. I've worked with thousands of clients. And as I work with clients, like I have to learn so much about them. And there's like all these questions, and I talked about this on my episode where I said, like, how I assess a client. I have to learn so much about them so that we can target fat loss the right way for that client. So most people, first let's talk about number one. A couple of things that I'm gonna really get to the bottom of here on this episode. Number one is most people are under eating, overtraining, right? They think they need to do more cardio, work out more, then they underat, they cut their nutrition, which seems like it makes sense, right? But what does that cause? A lot of times, again, depends on your age, your height, your weight, your blood type. I mean, there's so many factors on fat loss and what what you need to do for fat loss, but most of the times that just cause in a lot of inflammation and it puts your body in fight or flight mode. Okay. So that's the first no-no is like the under-eating overtraining. You need to nourish your body to dial in fat loss. Do you know how many people I've had to fix metabolically? Metabolically, I'm like, you're gonna eat more. And they're like, What? A client, uh a young client, my nanny, that I'm work I've been I've helped the last few months. Young girl, under eating to lose weight, gains the weight, under eats to lose weight. And I've completely metabolically reset her, and she looks and feels phenomenal. You have to get your hormones in check. You have to get your metabolism in check to make sure that you get dialed in with fat loss. And you're probably sitting there like, well, how do I do it? How do I do it? How do I do it? There's a lot of questions that you gotta ask. And this again, when I talked about it in my how I assess a client, you gotta really sit down with someone and address those things blood type, um, your labs, uh uh, your age, your height, your weight, hormones. Like, there's so many things you need to look at before we can map out a simple strategic protocol for you to dial in fat loss. But the most common mistakes is under eating, overtraining. We don't want to do that. Skipping meals. That's another problem. Not eating enough protein. I mean, everybody knows right now it's like viral. Protein, protein, protein, protein, 30 grams. They changed the freaking food pyramid, didn't they? They changed if I'm looking at my producers, they changed the freaking food pyramid. Proteins first. Okay. Yes, protein first thing in the morning. Don't skip meals. And sometimes our day gets away with us. There's so many options now to get that protein in. I mean, I think in my bag, I'm like looking around, I have these protein gummies. I mean, there's protein gummies, there's protein shots, there's protein water, there's so many ways to get in amino acids. You guys, amino acids are the building blocks of your body. Amino acids, which I will get into in a sec, but amino acids are also what create peptides. I'm a huge peptide enthusiast, I'm a huge peptide guru. You guys know I'm launching my own company. This is a huge topic. I will be talking about a lot. Okay, so too much cardio, not enough strength training. Too much cardio, not enough strength training. Who is it? I don't cardio is great to condition your what? Your heart. Okay, that's what cardio means. Cardio in Greek means heart. That's where the root of the word comes from. Now I sound like my big fat Greek granny. Cardio, cardia in Greek is heart. Cardio means heart. So we want to condition our heart. We want to make sure our heart is healthy. But that first comes from diet, you guys. You're eating a bunch of crap and your cholesterol is out of whack and you're blocking artery. Like, why are you doing cardio? Like, are you I see all these overweight people taking spin classes? I see all these overweight people doing cardio. No, let's focus on your nutrition, let's focus on what's going on cellularly, your labs, and let's target root-caused issues to get your body metabolically working correctly. Okay. So, what which leads into my next point: ignoring hormones and gut health. Number one. And you know what the number one thing is that stimulates hormonal health? Fats, and what we're all our moms doing in the 90s: no fat, low fat, diet, non-fat, non-fat, non-fat. Fats are what stimulate new hormone cells. Okay. Healthy fats, avocados, olive oil, okay, raw almonds, healthy fats, healthy hormones. Okay. Gut health. So many people I work with have inflammation going on in their gut, and I call it hormone weight. It's not even fat loss. Like, yeah, sure they have fat loss that maybe needs to happen, but it's this hormone fluff that happens in your 40s, 50s, the menopause. Why? Hormones are out of whack. Years of poor lifestyle choices, environmental stuff going on. Um things shift cellularly in our body and things get missignaled. So you you gotta dial that in and you can't ignore it. And that's where like even the skinny fat happens, right? Like skinny fat versus strong and lean. I even have clients I'm working with, they're not necessarily overweight, they're not necessarily have a lot of fat to lose, but they have this hormone weight. They have this like gut problem, like they feel poofy in their midsection, and they're like, they just feel like they can't, they're not as lean as they used to be. That's hormone, hormone weight. And we got to get down to the root cause of it. And this is where peptides have changed the game. Okay. They've changed the game in the health and fitness space. And, you know, I have to legally say this is for this is for educational purposes and research purposes only. I am not a doctor. However, I have studied the space for three years. I've worked with doctors, nurse practitioners, and I'm very confident in my education, and I'm still learning, just like everybody's learning right now. This is a new space, on where peptides kind of fit into our health. And it's important to understand, I'm gonna do a whole episode on this. Peptides are chains of amino acids. What do we talk about? Protein. Amino acids that resignal things in our cells. And again, why is that resignaling happening? Environmental changes, years of poor eating, yo-yo dieting, years of, I don't know, drinking alcohol, like bad choices, not sleeping, stress. I mean, let's get into it. Stress is the number one cause of people not losing fat. Cortisol, if your cortisol's through the roof, you won't lose body fat for nothing. Nothing, zero. You gotta get it under control. Well, Melina, how do I get it under control? Well, it takes some time. It takes some time. So, you know, you're not gonna lose your 10 pounds before your trip next week by eating nothing. All you're doing is losing water weight and stressing the heck out of your body. That's not what you do. I used to have people, they've come to me so much recently, but I remember like, I have a trip next month. And it could be like two weeks away. They're like, I want to lose 10 pounds. I'm like, impossible. You're not gonna lose 10 pounds. I mean, we could put you on a fast, you could lose some water weight, could deplete you a little bit. Like, you're not losing real weight though. It's not real. So what do you want? What do you care more about? And this is where we get into peptides going wrong. And I will talk about this on my peptide, one of my peptide episodes, I'm gonna have many. But peptides, specific ones for fat loss, can really help resignal things correctly. But when you're doing these peptides, you need to make sure that your diet is dialed in, your supplementation is dialed in, and you have an entire protocol mapped out, customized to you and your hormones, your blood work, your labs, your blood type. And it will it will it will fast track and enhance your fat loss journey fairly quickly. Okay. And I'm the I'm the first person to say I 100% support it when it's done correctly. And that's why I do peptide consults all day. Um, so again, you know, fat loss isn't about eating less. It's about your body, you know, finally feeling safe enough to let go of that of that fat. So you're probably thinking, okay, Melina, it's not about eating less. Like you made your point. You're like, okay, maybe you're taking notes, watching this episode, listening to this episode. I hope you are, because this is like amazing advice if you want to tap into body fat storage and really focus on burning fat, not muscle. Um, you're probably thinking, what's the first thing that I do? And first thing you need to do is like map out what your day looks like. Like you can't do something that doesn't fit your schedule. So you have to make your choices fit your lifestyle and your schedule. That is one thing that I always do with clients. I feel like that really sets me apart. I'm not gonna tell someone to eat something if they just can't eat it, they're not gonna cook at home, that doesn't fit their schedule. We have to kind of align your supplements, your food, and all that, like with your schedule to make it work. Whether you work nights, whether you, you know, get up at five or you're like, no, I sleep in, like, I don't like cooking dinner, I'm on the go. I had a client yesterday, I just did a full nutrition assessment, and she's like, I eat out lunch every day. No problem. No problem. We gotta make it work. You cannot go hours and hours and hours without skipping meals. That's like one of the first things. The first thing is like, what's your morning routine? What does your day look like? And what is your nighttime routine? Okay. If you're not sleeping well, what is that gonna do? That's gonna spike your cortisol even more. You will not burn body fat. So you gotta have a morning routine, a day routine, and a nighttime routine. You have to have that. And everyone's routine is different. Doesn't mean your routine is my routine. Everybody's routine is different. But I'll give you some tips here, because that's what we're here for. Are you drinking water first thing in the morning? You're like probably in the car, like, oh, I should drink more. You're listening to this in the car. Oh, I should drink more water. I mean, you guys, water is the number one reason why people are not one of the number one re one of the top reasons why people don't lose weight. They're dehydrated and they eat instead of drinking water. Now, all water is not created equal. Let's talk about electrolytes in your water. First thing in the morning, put those electrolytes in your water. First thing in the morning, take a pre and probiotic. Okay. First thing in the morning, get the protein in. Okay. If you're on certain peptides or you have certain again, everybody's gonna have a different protocol. Some things you're gonna do first thing in the morning. There's a reason for that for our bodies cellularly to signal things. Okay. And I have an amazing peptide episode that I'm gonna talk about a few things, and I'll I'll piggyback from the from the um fat loss on some peptides that'll help with that. Aside from GLPs, GLP ones. So you got your water, you know, you're hydrating, you're not going to the caffeine, you're you're really hydrating, you're getting in nourishment, you're getting in protein, and you're kickstarting your metabolism. Most women, 40 or higher, should not be doing fasted things. Okay. I I literally have studied fasting. You're gonna hear a million opinions about this. The average woman should not be doing, oh, I fast till one o'clock. No. I'm just gonna say no. This is my opinion, this is my show. No. Okay. Get your nourishment in, nourish your body, hydrate, greens, fiber, protein, nourish your hormones. Okay. And again, your food choices depend on a lot of things. Your, your, your, um, your age, your blood type. I'm really big on blood eating around your blood type, uh, and things you like and so on. Um, so that's the first focus on your morning routine. Now, if you're gonna go train in the morning, like let's we gotta organize your where'd your workouts go, but excuse me. Pre and post-workout meals, pre and post-workout meals are the number one reason why people are either A, getting results or B not getting results. I talk about this, I teach group fitness. I love group fitness. I feel like I'll teach group fitness till I'm like 85 years old, unless God willing. I literally talk about this like when I start class, I'm like, when I end class, I'm like, you guys got some amino acids in you, everyone hydrated. And then after we're after we teach after I teach, you guys get your 30 grams of protein in between 30 to 60 minutes. We want to keep our metabolism going. We want to build muscle, burn fat. That alone will change your results. Pre- and post-workout meals. Nourishment, protein, not a bunch of fats, protein, maybe a little fruit, a little carbs, because protein carb together stimulate protein synthesis. Okay, that's how we build muscle. So maybe a little protein fruit pre and a little protein fruit post. As long as you're getting that 30 grams in, you're rebuilding and you're repairing that muscle. We don't want to lose muscle, we want to lose fat. Okay. There's more, again, more with pre and post-workout meals, but that is like a good rule of thumb. So if there's anything you can take away from this episode, is that you're like, what if I don't work out a lot? Like, do I still need to eat as much protein to burn fat? Yes. Yes. Protein is also a metabolic driver. Okay. Sleep is gonna affect your metabolism, cortisol is gonna affect your metabolism, the amount of protein that you take in is gonna affect your metabolism. The more muscle you have, the more your body metabolically will burn stored glucose and fat. Okay. Um digestion, gut health. I know, like TMI, like, are you going to the bathroom regularly? Are you emptying? Like that is very important. Like, digestion is a big thing. How your body's like absorbing and processing food is gonna also be a factor in your weight loss, in your fat loss. So this is where like the peptides really can help things because a lot of people metabolically, like they're they have really low A1C levels, their insulin response is low. And so, if you don't know how to regulate your blood sugar and like you're you're not regulated in that way, this is where like peptides can come in and really help shift and move things along faster, along with you changing your diet and doing all the things that I just talked about. Like, that's why like you have to have that dialed in first. You have to have that dialed in first before you go and do these other things to help you. Um, but it's motivating, right? Like if you're really overweight and you're like, man, like the dieting and the exercising is just not working fast enough. We have these tools, we have these supplements, we have these peptides now that can really help push and shift things along in a faster way. They work fast, they enter your bloodstream. Within 90 minutes, they attack you, they attack, they like hit your cells, they resignal. It's it's wild, you guys, what they do. It's gonna change the health and fitness space. This is this is changing it, okay? Don't outwork out, uh, out, out train or out peptide, a bad diet, though. You gotta get your nutrition dilted. And it doesn't need to be this crazy strict thing. Like, you can go out to eat and get a salad. You can go out to eat and get a nice piece of protein, salmon, veggies, like nourish your body, whole foods. Okay. That is gonna be the game changer, though, in your fat loss is making those little shifts. So, morning routine, what does your day look like? Pre and post-workout meals. Are you writing this down? What is your night routine? How are you winding down? Are we on screens? I mean, I do it sometimes. I get it. Red light therapy, take a shower. I talked about this, I feel like in one of my episodes. Take a shower. Like it calms your nervous system. Just a rinse. Hot water, morning cold water, right? Hot water, calm your body down. Takes five minutes. It's a big deal on how you'll sleep. Trust me. There's like studies on this. And I'm excited because I actually have a guest coming on in one of my next episodes that we're gonna literally be diving into all things sleep. So you have to tune into that. And sleep is huge on your metabolism, like I just said, with the cortisol, metabolic driver. Um, and you know, I'm a mom of two little kids, and my sleep like sometimes is all over the place, but I still make sure that I have my routines. My husband like laughs at me. And I think I I even talked about this. I feel like I feel like I did, unless I just talk about it in general. I he laughs because, like, sometimes, even in all the chaos, I'm still doing my morning routine. I'm still doing it, even if it's delayed. I'm like, oh my god, I haven't had my electrolytes yet. I gotta stop what I'm doing, chug my water, dry brush, get myself together, pop my red light on for a minute, even if it's a minute. Like, I do those things to set my body up, my my nervous system, my cellular system, my everything set it up for the day. It's a big deal. It's not a small deal, it's a big deal. Morning routine, night routine, big deal. Remember that. Um, you know, I'm gonna wrap up here because again, I could I could talk about this forever and ever and ever and ever and ever. But you know, fat loss is metabolic and it's a hormonal game. And that's why you have to shift as you go and as you grow. You have to make changes. It's not the same thing, and that's the ver the most common thing. It's like, oh, I used to look like this in high school. First of all, high school, you're not an adult. I say that all the time. Oh, I used to do this, or when I, you know, because I always I love people to paint that picture. When did you look and feel your best? When were you your leanest? Maybe you weren't ever lean. Let's fix it. Let's fix it, right? That picture is that motivation, right? But you gotta get down to the nitty-gritty, and it's it doesn't need to be overcomplicated. Okay, get the help that you need. Take tips, re-listen to this episode, write things down, notice things. I hope you notice things about your day, your lifestyle, your choices that maybe you need to shift to start tapping into that fat loss. And please always reach out. That's what I'm here for. I do consults all day, every day. You can just comment or DM me on my social media. Um, I'm gonna have some some resources in The show notes, you guys. Um, yeah, just just comment, lean, and I'll send you some framework. We'll set up a consult. We'll get you, you know, we'll get you dialed in on your fat loss. I also have a free fat loss guide that I send out. Um, I've been sending out, I do a fat loss email every Friday. So make sure you're subscribed to MolinaFitness.com slash subscribe. I send a fat loss, it's like fat loss Friday. I send a tip on fat loss every Friday. Free. Sometimes I send a guy, I have a free guide right now. So download it, like use the resources, gather your information and map out your day, your lifestyle, your labs, your blood type. Like all this has to be customized to you. It's not a copy paste. All right, you guys, I'll see you next time. Thanks for tuning in to the Melina Method podcast. I hope you're fired up to make a shift in your life. That's the whole point. So if this episode spoke to you, subscribe to my weekly insider. It's MelinaFitness.com slash subscribe. It's all the fun things that you want to get to know me and know what's coming up and what's the latest tea on the Melina Method. So I will see you guys next time.