A New Beginning at 46: How Daniel Shed 13kg with Smart Choices

In this transformative episode of FitMitTuro Fitness Podcast I speak with my client Daniel, a 46-year-old Portuguese living in Sweden,how he lost 13 kgs. Over nine months, Daniel dropped from 104 kg to 91 kg through a combination of disciplined dieting, increased protein intake, vegetables and regular exercise. More than just shedding kilos, Daniel saw significant health improvements including better blood pressure and cholesterol levels, alongside enhanced sleep quality thanks to reduced alcohol consumption.
Hear how Daniel’s lifestyle changes not only affected him but also inspired his family to adopt healthier habits. Dive into a discussion on the crucial roles of consistency, tracking progress, and balancing diet with cardio as Daniel plans to continue refining his fitness regime. Whether you’re looking for motivation or practical advice, this episode provides valuable insights into making sustainable lifestyle changes that lead to real and lasting health benefits.

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Transcript

0:56

No problem. All right, we are live. Daniel, welcome to my show and create the first of all, great to see you. I honestly, I really didn't talk at all, because I always want to start right away recording. I feel like that we are always missing some part of the best stuff when we said something before, and then it's kind of, it feels like kind of that we are making up, asking how we are when we already talked about these things just a couple of minutes ago. So Daniel, how are you doing? Man, yeah, it's good. It's good. It's, it's good. I'm, feeling good, and still see quite a lot of progress. So it's it's very positive. It's good, nice. Would you mind first of all, like, obviously, I know you, but would you mind telling people little bit about yourself, like who you are, where you live, about your background, little bit and now absolutely so. My name is Daniel. I'm 46 years old. I'm born and raised in Portugal, where I moved from around 20 years ago to Sweden. Moved to Sweden because of a relationship, and been married, have a doctor with 17 years old. Now, I live in Sweden, and I've been living here all the time since then, live in a small city in the south of Sweden called elmhut, that it is actually the capital of IKEA, or is where IKEA started, and where still quite a lot of the main offices of the corporation are. And that's where I work, and I've been working also for quite many years. And I, I work in in a position with the development of range and and the supply of the range of the products that are available on the stores. So and I and, yeah, like in any other corporation, or like in any other kind of work, it is global work. It involves quite a lot of traveling, quite a lot of I see it responsible for quite a big organization. And, yeah, and it is quite stressful life, and it's fun, but at times it comes with a bit of with a bit of stress. Yeah, and that's, that's, that's me, yeah, no, that's, that's, that's fair enough like, and it's like, about you, how we get to knew each other, like a little bit about that. Where did you find me? How did we end up working together? That's so I met you, Turo, because I have been almost since the introduction of Tiktok. I have been quite the consumer of Tiktok, not a user, so I've not been posting. So I've been actually observing and consuming content from from it. And by some reason, maybe sometime, I was looking for fitness, or for getting in shape or something like that. And you, you start appearing quite a lot in my in my stream, or in the flow of videos that came in to me, and I followed you for, I think, for a new year or something like that. And in December last year, you at the video where you posted that you were offering a personal training for free month for free. And yeah, at the time, I didn't put so much thought on it, so more than, yeah, why not? And I just followed the instructions. And it was about sending a motivation, why I would like to to get it and what were, what was a bit of my background and so on. And to my surprise, you, you send me an email a couple of days after and saying that congratulations to you. You got it and and since then we Yeah, you, you have been coaching me and training me and giving quite a lot of orientation. And that is. Now, what nine months? So that we have been doing it always in the same format, where in the form of a personal trainer. So, yeah, yeah, it's now, it's, I was looking back. It was December 8, 2023 and now, when we record this, it's a focus 26 so it's like eight and a half, almost nine months and but if you remember back back in or like in December, what motivated you to start that your journey, what, what made you to reach out and contact, yeah, a bit the aspects that I was mentioned, it was a bit connected to stress, but I don't know it's my personality always had put me in in a position that in times of stress, I have a tendency not to take very good care of myself. So during the pandemic, I was training quite a lot in the time of Corona but then I doing sports. I broke a leg, and associated to that, I stopped doing exercise, and it went very quick. So again, I'm 46 and my metabolism is is a bit different of what it was before. And I gain quite a lot of weight, quite fast. Starting having problems with the sleep quality, starting have problems with the Yeah, with blood pressure, cholesterol, all this kind of things and and, yeah, it was pretty I mean, my body was telling me very clearly that I needed to do some change, because otherwise my quality of life was about to get very low, very short, and That was already feeling that my I didn't have the energy, and I started medical problems. So my blood pressure was quite high and and I had problems with cholesterol and stuff like that. And yeah, and either you can try to ignore it and go to the doctor and get some medicines and so on. But you never really solve the base problem, or you don't address the base problem. And yeah, and I try actively to do something about it, but then also knowing myself, it is, it had been, it had been a struggle before, when I went in this period that I was training more intensively, because, of course, you know, with the right amount of time and reading and research, you always can find Good, good training programs. And you you can find, yeah, good habits and so and so on. But again, you know, at my age, I know enough about me to know that if I don't have an external motivation, they are not too long lasting, and they don't happen so and if I don't have good coaching around me. So I have done a lot of mistakes before, when I trained, and I trained too much, and I went in these periods that I could not train because I got injuries of over exercising and start eating, in a way, to bulk, to create muscle. What is not maybe so smart when you are my age and all this kind of stuff. So and then I decided that, yeah, for me, was the right time to come and unseek Someone that that I've experienced and knows what, what they are doing, and they've advised other people and ever, if someone that ever a lot of other people that they can compare with and adapt their strategies and individualize their strategies, and yeah, in my case with you, it worked perfectly. Then if I needed to say what my biggest learning, and I almost feel a bit I'm very happy for it, but I almost feel a bit ashamed of saying it be we all learn at school the importance of eating correctly and balancing our diet and eating According to the wheel of food and so on. But in some strange way, I mean, I was never following that. You know, you fall for the carbs and the sweets and all these things that give you these small pleasures and chemically activate you in a positive way. And I. And I just realized now, after this month with you, how you know how bad I was eating, and that I have to say that is the biggest transformation, is the discipline of eating in the correct way, still in a way that you eat everything and you still satisfied and you feel, never angry, but, but eating correctly in a way that you you see both the results in your health, but, yeah, learning how to eat. I have to say that that was my biggest, biggest. Wow, yeah. But is it not like when, when I think, like, my I I wasn't eating health yet. I still not. I'm still ignoring, probably, often times, even a lot too much, like kind of foods I know that I wouldn't I shouldn't be eating, or I should be eating a bit less. But it's then, in the end, like, obviously, I think also that you gotta have some kind of flexibility. But on the other hand, like, more you eat, like, kind of, in a when everything, what you are eating is mostly healthy, then, like, the rest doesn't matter, and it's, it's funny, like, how like, because now, if I earlier, if I think, like, back in my own thing, like, if I, if I could choose, like, I would go to eat, I would choose, always like to get some french fries and burger or pizza or something. And now, when I think that if I have a free choose what I would be eating, that wouldn't be anymore my what I would choose, I would choose totally different even though those things are available, but because I know now how it makes my body feel. Maybe at the moment, they are giving you a pleasure for sort like a five minute time, and then right after you finish it, you are like, ah, what? What I What did I do? And it's, it's just that, you know, I don't know. Maybe it's getting smarter or older or I don't know what it is, but, no, but I think is, is you also have teach me one, one thing, I mean, that you make me realize a couple of things like this, accountability. So I remember that when we started, one of the things that I told you was, well, you know, I still keep a healthy active lifestyle, so where I try to walk and exercise and so on and and I said to you that I'm walking 10,000 steps per day, around in average, and so on. And that makes me realize that the brain is very selective with what it remembers. Yes, I have a couple of days per month where I walk 10,000 steps, but when you start tracking it and you get the records over nine months, they are not even 50% of the days that I walk 10,000 steps. And they are not far away. They are in the 8000s and in the 7000 in the 9000s and so on. But they are not then and and is this realization of of tracking things, not, not in a very How should I say, not in a you should the routines should not, and this tracking should not become like a religion, but, but it's good to do at the time, so that you get the check out of reality, you know. And this is same with food. I remember that in the beginning, you provided also an app where I could track my calories to start getting a little bit of a feeling where I was and what it meant to be a bit in a deficit and so on. And it took me two or three months to adapt to that, but then I sort of understood it. But so from times to times, you need really to check and saying is reality, really checking with my perception of things or not. And that is something that I learned during this nine months, no, it is like the tracking, it helps so much, because what gets measured gets you pay more attention. You pay you start to actually carry those things like it's saying, like, if you, if you're, whatever your goal is, it's, it could be if your goal is to save some money, but you never look how much is going out, how much is coming in, and you just tell that your goal is to save money and but if, in the end of the month, you are spending more than you are earning, obviously the goal, you are not reaching your goal. And it's same thing with the food. Food, like if you don't, if you know how much you are, more or less how much is going out. But if you have no idea how much is coming in or or what you are doing, it's it's very easy to say, and even you have a feeling like it's same with the work. Like, if you, if you think like that, you you might work very hard, very long days, but if you don't know how much you are making, it's. It's very hard like that doesn't tell anything. It's in with the diet, if you think that you are doing so great, but then you know at the weekend you are, you are going letting a little bit loose, more loosen, and going out. And it's so easy to basically ruin everything, what you have accomplished during the week just within a couple days and but that's, it's not only only in a diet, it's basically all areas in in life and and just attracting it's with the steps. Like, you know, when you are able to see it, you are like that, because we tend to, like, overestimate what we are actually doing. And it's, it's the same thing with the foods, with the steps. You think that, yeah, I'm doing okay. It's not that bad. But then when you have it in a paper or somewhere on your records, and you are seeing that maybe I wasn't actually that good as I thought, No, our brain is, it's, it's a very it's very effective to to trick us in in being this, yeah, in Saving energy and all these kind of things. So what it helped us in many situations, through evolution, but but right now in the society that we live with, sometimes it works a little bit against us, sort of at least against me. Then the other positive thing that you have came out of the of this nine months. And it is that a big objective that I had with was to go down in weight, and again, to to improve quite a lot of this under these medical conditions. And just to give a reference point, you know, I'm not I'm not that short. I'm 182 in 182 in height, so one meter and 82 centimeters and but I was weighing 104 kilos. And what was, what was quite a lot. And if we take this BMI measurement, that is, even if it's a bit sealed or scientifical, but I was, I was extremely overweight, and I was, I mean, it was not just the BMI. I was overweighted, but being in this very natural deficit where actually I'm eating today much more towards what I really need and what I consume in the day to day, because my work doesn't demand any physical work. I mean, it's, you know, I'm sitting in a desk and having meetings and stuff like that. I'm I'm feeling that I'm eating the right calories, but steadily I have been. Today I'm weighing 92 almost 91 kilos. So in, in those nine months, is what is that? Is 1213, kilos. Yeah, kilos, yeah, and, and you can see it, you know, I you don't hear it from mouth to mouth, but in my mouth, you you see it. You know people around me come and I feel that. I feel much, you know, everything has improved. I mean, from from my mobility, my flexibility, my how much I my endurance, I can do much more cardio. I mean, everything improved. So it's, it's absolutely no doubt. And the journey is not finished. I mean, it's, I still have some, some, some way to lose, but it's very sustainable to do it in this way. If I put it like that, and this is, this is, first of all, huge congrats. This is amazing progress. It doesn't happen every day. Like to get someone even, you know, if you think it like it's a, it's a one and a half kilos per month throughout the eight, nine period of time, and which is very good progress. And because, if you like, many people are getting frustrated. They think that, you know, I, I lose two kilos a month. That's nothing. It's way too slow. Or if you if some months you lose one kilo, or some months, you didn't even lose a weight. So how, how that progress for you? How it was looking like month to month? Like? Was it going like it was obviously, some people, they lose faster in the beginning. Some people takes a bit longer, but it starts to go. But then what I always tend to see that if you keep going like, let's say, six months, nine months here, then usually you get what you deserve. So if you if it's like for first month, for two months, you might not, you might be doing everything correctly, but you just don't see the results yet. But then in a longer period of time, more or less you get what you kind of deserve. So yeah, absolutely. So in my case, was the. First four kilos, they're coming under the 100 kilos. They it went rather fast, I think that I managed, like in a one and a half month, and that was just by I actually don't have any idea how many calories I was consuming in average per day, you know, because if you go down to this with the counting calories that I'm out of, and I've been out for for a very long time now, but I was, I went in depth. So I was consuming around 2000 2100 calories per day. So I think that those kilos was just, I just start consuming less calories per day, and and that naturally with my with what I was doing and my metabolism and so on, it burned those ones. Then I had a little bit of a time there where, after one and a half two months, where I was feeling a bit more angry, and that was physically, I was much more active, and it slowed down a little bit, but then, I don't really understand the mechanism, but it then started accelerating towards a steady pace every month, you know that I, I lost those one and half, like you're saying, one and a half kilo or something, every month, it have helped quite a lot. So the diet, again, like I think that I mentioned it before, but I have not changed my diet in terms of what I was eating. So maybe before, I could have eaten three pieces a month, and I'm not eating three pieces, but I have not stopped eating pizzas. So if I put it like that, and I'm not so everything that I was eating before I'm still eating, but then it's just I have adapted my amount of protein so it's a higher percentage of protein daily that I take a little bit less of carbs and much more greens and so on. In my diet that still keep me full. I have a sensation that I'm not angry, but the total intake and that journey, it was, it was challenging, I have to say, because it seems easy to consume protein, I mean fish and meat and beans and so on, and whatever that people now decide to eat as a protein intake, but in those quantities, actually that are necessary. It's an exercise of discipline, because at least in my case, I was heavy, heavy, heavy in carbs and sugar and or the sugar was not a lot of quantities, but a lot of calories, but, but it was the protein intake that actually made the change, and choosing also protein sources that are efficient, like chicken breast, no, no fats, no nothing. So lean meats and so on. So it changed maybe a little bit the proportions, that maybe I'm eating much more chicken today, that what I was doing before, and stuff like that. But that was, it was, that was the biggest change. So for me, it was a difficult period of the patient to eat more protein, and I could not be disciplined every day. You know, it was a process until that I could get there. But then one thing that you have done also very, very wisely, it was to always break every month, breaking my training routines. And the combination of those two aspects added a very positive effect through time, so that I was not training the same stuff, like for two months, I was always breaking that routine. So the the body was getting a bit of a shock. The he was adapting to it more protein and and really get away from this addiction to carbs, or get that quantity of carbs. And for me, what, what it made it and now, after nine months, you know, I could see that it's possible still to go back to those old habits. I will not do it because I don't want to end up in the same situation, but it could. But so I'm not saying yet that I'm totally out of the risk zone, but I see it like you're saying, like I said before. Over time, your brain gets a bit rewired, and you understand that what is good for you and what is not good for you and you, you have a instinct that you build that saying, I will not eat that those fries because, I mean, they don't gonna give me nothing that is a very, very short pleasure that that actually gonna damage me. And I still eat fries, but like you said, I don't eat them item now and then, but I don't eat them that four times a week, if I put it like that, or five times. A week or six times a week, or whatever. So so that had been the biggest learnings and changes for me. Yeah, this is, I think this is the best way to explain it like but to still not trying to cut everything out like that, because it's not then you would rely only on your willpower and discipline. But now, like you are still, basically you make sure I know, if I understood it, how you are doing it like that, your minimum is to eat those vegetables, have that one big salad per day, making sure you are having enough protein. And then when you hit those two goals, basically everything else is automatically going to be okay and you have less because that is, there is a there is a science actually, behind why you have less cravings, why you have because when you have protein, you have a more fiber, it improves. Those are more sativa nutrients. And then once you have those two things, it's automatically less from something else you have automatically less sweet cravings. You don't want to have sugar, you don't want to have those other things. Or even if you want, or you are eating them, the amounts you are going to eat, they are going to be so less. And in the in that's kind of positive circle where you are going in and and that's the how it's possible to not feel like that you still can eat whatever you want that you don't you have that is basically typical. What you are feeling is that you didn't even change that much, that you were just basically eating a little bit differently. Yeah, yeah. And instead of focusing adding things, instead of taking things away exactly, absolutely, it's adding things. And then the other thing that they just run a bit to decide, then I have to say that it also has supported me quite a lot. I mean, it's not all the time that I answer, but the I mean, you, you keep a track, and you keep pushing, and you, you are always that voice of your conscious voice that is there and saying, Have you done it? Have you done it? And not, at least in my experience, not in a way that I ever perceived as someone was hunting me. But it was very positive and incentive, like you are doing great progress. You know, I was going and I was feeling it was never from a perspective of you need to do this or you need to do that. It was always challenging, so that I should feel the responsibility to put those goals and so on. And you were always there, supporting and and being very present. You know you, I can say that you and me have had the at least a message conversation, at least three times a week for the next for the West nine and off. So and that, you know, so you became a very present part in my life, you know, so, and that's good to me. It supported me. So, yeah, no, absolutely. And that is, that is what I love to do. Like, it was, like I said, for all my new clients, my goal is, first to become friends and then, like, it's not my style of coaching. Maybe somebody needs it, like a kind of military style that this is to do, this is to do. No, my goal is how I try to Hawaii as a person, how would work for me and and what is my style of coaching? Is that, like I I try you to understand that what you need to be doing without kind of that I'm actually telling you that you need to do it, but that it comes from you. Because there is a there is a like, there is a huge difference if I tell you that you have to eat the protein, or if I explain you why you should be eating protein, and then in the end you you end up doing exactly the same thing. But when that idea kind of coming is coming from you, you understand that this is actually important for me. I need to do it, then it's a lot more likely that you are actually sticking with that, that plan, and creating that absolutely, absolutely so. But it is, it is like that. You know, before, I always had a little bit of a smile every time that I saw these pictures, you know, like in in advertisement or like in whatever they could be, this before and after pictures. I never really believed in the concept, and I was a bit cynical, maybe about that, but, but the fact is, here I am now after nine months, and you always recommended me to take those pictures to have as a reference, and here I am, and they are for real, those pictures, so they are for real, and it works, and so on. But it is important. I mean, it's a process of self learning. It is actually what I take most of of this last nine months is a process of self learning, and it's not. It's about you know that you decide that you really are determined to take care of yourself till. So that you have as good qualitative time as you can have you want to take care of yourself, and that things don't happen overnight, and that you should not, not do any extreme changes in your life. That's that's a risk, that that worked for me. So I'm still, you know, doing sort of the same things, and like I was doing before. I'm exercising way more than what I was doing. I'm exercising three times a week and around one hour, and I'm trying to walk to work and not to walk, and not to to drive and so on. So I'm physically more active, but it is. It is an exercise where you decide that you want to do it, and you you, you make you, I mean that you are honest with yourself, because it starts with that, because the day that you are not honest with yourself, then, then it doesn't really going to work. And it's, it is this realization that if you, if you are not honest with yourself, it's sort of the biggest damage that you you can do to yourself, you know. It's, it's the only person that you absolutely need to be honest is with yourself, you know. And that, again, it was, it's not that I was not doing it before, but I was not doing it as consciously. I was not conscious about it and and I was not and I was not disciplined enough to keep a certain frequency that actually, that I actually need to do so in the end of the day, no rocket science and no a lot of new things that have came, but the results are there. So it's do the small things, do the small adjustments, change your life gradually. And yeah, and I see, I see it now, and I will keep with the with this journey. So, yeah, how, how do you mention about, about exercising, like changing things every four weeks, like how we have been doing it. What? What have you done in the past? And what, how it feels like this? Yeah. What was the difference? Yeah. So, I mean, I was physically active when I was, you know, in my 20s, and then after I was not so much physical, I was doing stuff, you know, like I could play squash or mint, and I was doing stuff, but not physically, I think. Then when I came in my late 30s, I decided to start going to the gym. And I went to the gym, but at that time, you know, a bit, you know, almost instinctively. You look people around, you read a bit, you see a couple of videos, you read a bit on the internet. You understand the basic principles. But I was doing everything wrong because I went to specialized training of muscles. You know, I was focusing a specific muscle group and so on. And maybe you can do that if you, if you are 20, because you, you know, still want to get a lot of muscle growth and so on. But it was not giving me so much, and I was training way too much. I was training six days a week, and it was, you know, no resting time and again, it led to injuries and to almost no results. I actually got stronger during the period and so on, but it was just wrong. It was everything that I was doing was more or less wrong. I was doing stretching, and I was doing all these kind of things, but it was just wrong, purely wrong. I was doing more damage to myself than good. I understand that now the trainings now, they are all around. You know, I don't focus in a muscle group. I think that your trainings from the beginning, I don't have any train paths that I don't do. Every focus on everything. So I try it's always an exercise for legs and for for back and for breast, for chest and for arms. So you, it's you train almost everything without, without ever you add a couple of months where you, where I went up in weight, so that we focus on that. But I never could push myself, for example, to go to failure, you know, to be there and and be in failure the way you train so much that you the muscle gets in failure. Or at least, I never pushed myself to that. But I have increased the weight load, at least with, in some muscle groups, I have increased it with, with 100% so I started with breast with, I don't even remember, but with 4050, kilos. And now I'm closer to 100 and I start legs with, with Bard and web. I started with around, I don't know, just the bar in the beginning, like 20 kilos on today. I mean, I'm closer to 100 also. So it's, it's coming, but it's coming in, in a way that I push it a little bit without going to failure, and I allow it to take several months to to end them, but it's always a break. Is these things that, to me, was very important, is some days you focus a little bit more on cardio, you go through all your body, but you do new exercises, you stimulate yourself in a different way. What? A lot? Yeah, no, that's, that's what I what I found out like would have worked for like myself, for many of my clients, this type of kind of thing like that, you focus one thing at a time and over several months, like now, you have been doing this for nine months, so it's not always doing more. It's actually like, in New York is it's it was reducing, doing less, having allowing your party to have some recovery, doing things like, I'm a big believer of full body workouts, like you mentioned. Like, it's because it's even you have been like you said you, you have been doing, working out consistently three times per week. But obviously there have been a weeks that it wasn't three times you missed some workouts, but in over nine period of over nine months past nine months, there were not never, like, really long periods that you missed several workouts. So you have been very consistent. And then, then it's, it's that you have the surf, your results, it's, it's, but it's, it's, often it's almost impossible, really hard to believe like that. You can see that, wow, how it's possible to get like actually better results by working out less. And this is something, what i i understood myself also as an as an exerciser, professional and athlete, because it was mentality was always like that if workout didn't feel exhausting, or if I wasn't tired after workout, it meant that it wasn't a good workout, that I needed to work out at least hour, at least one and a half hours, and now over I'm 42 understanding that I'm not having that full hour. Often it's sometimes I have to do 20 minutes. It's a 30 minute, 15 minute sessions, but getting that consistency that is more important than actually healing perfectly for a couple of weeks and then either not having a time or being insert and not being able to work out as consistently as but as now and you in the long, long run, you see a lot better results, and you feel just like better. Yeah, that one thing that I would like also to mention that to me helped me quite a lot. So I, like I mentioned before, I I travel quite a lot at work and privately, we travel quite a lot. And, yeah, sometimes you, you get in these hotels that have okay gym, you know, they have left the basic machines and so on, but they will not, but sometimes I also have been in hotels where they don't have any training facilities, and there you also have been very supportive, you know, just giving these 568, exercises that you can do just with body weight, and like simple exercises that just to keep that, you know, the movement happening and and that made the whole difference. Because before the in when I was doing the working trip special to Asia, or to the US, where, when the time zones were different, it took me a bit of time to adapt to the time zone, and then, yeah, it was all these dinners and whatnot, and training or and exercise is nothing that you prioritize. And actually, again, is this perspective exercise, when I put the talk together, yeah, I spend around 6070, days, 80 days, for some years outside of home, what is quite a big proportion of the that I was not using. But right now, even if I'm traveling, I'm always doing I'm always doing something. So for example, during this vacation, I didn't have access to a lot of gyms, but then I was walking a lot, or I do other things, you know. So this mindset is you also helped me with, yeah, with these exercises that kept feeling that I was doing something so very All in all, a very positive change. It sounds like I would love to take all credit from this, but honestly, when you were traveling, I know that you didn't feel every time motivated to work out, or you are, and it's, it's, I didn't do any workout for you. So it have been only you who have done all the work. And now results, when you look back eight, nine months, you you have done the change and and I'm, I'm so proud of you. So for, for earlier we talked like, especially in the beginning, like when you started, like, your how alcohol consumption that it was impacting on your call. So can you change a little bit, like, how you have changed? What did you change? Many, any changes with regarding alcohol, yeah, do you know I'm and it is what it is. You know? It's, I come from South Europe, where people normally, at least here in the Scandinavian countries, they have a image of people in the south, that south of Europe, that they they drink moderately, but they can drink every day a little bit and so on. It was not my case. Actually. When I was living in Portugal, I was not drinking that much, or, you know, I was drinking sometimes at some dinners and with some friends and so on. But it was not a bit when I came to Sweden, and over the years, the Scandinavian culture is weak and drinking culture so you, most of the people that I know, they don't drink nothing during Monday to Friday and Sundays. They don't drink either, but Fridays and Saturdays. I mean, how should I put it? It's over, over a long period of time, is not healthy, or at least for me, not healthy. I mean, it's, it's a lot of quantities and and so on. So you sort of compensate for not drinking in the rest of the week and so on. So I was drinking regularly almost every weekend, at least couple of beers or some glasses of wine on the Friday, and then on the Saturday and so on. And it became an habit, and not a good one. And one thing that people will realize very soon is if you are in in a way that you need to go down in weight, and you evaluate the ratio of calories that you get per unit of alcohol and so on, you sort of realize that is not sustainable. You know, to combine alcohol in quantities with with going down in weight and being living a bit healthier, and I will not, I'm sure that is some positive effects of socially, of drinking alcohol and so on, but physically, I mean, it's not a lot of good ones do I stopped totally drinking alcohol. No, I have not, you know, but I went much more for qualitative time when I drink alcohol in the right dinner, in the right meal, is the same with eating beef. So by other reasons that have nothing to do with the training, I mainly environmental reasons. I I, I'm very conscious about how much beef or cow meat I eat, but that day that I eat, it needs to be qualitative. It needs then to be a very good beast that I really enjoy, because I still enjoy it. And it is the same with the alcohol I consume it, but I consume much, much, much, much more or less I is it can go now three, four weeks that I don't consume any alcohol at all, and then that day that I mean, that dinner, then I know exactly what wine I would like to drink. Then I enjoy that glass of wine. But the consumption is as reduced drastically, and is a pure, I mean, it's, it's a pure, it does just don't go together. You know, I don't have any feeling that I want to drink taco because I know that the next day, if I drink it in quantity, the next day, I gonna feel like shit. And I don't want to feel good, and it's not good so for me. And so that that had been, I had a relation of a weekend relation with alcohol, and that relation that became, now a monthly relation with alcohol, you know. And the quantities are, I cannot even speculate how much I was drinking before, because I never thought about it, but it needs to be a 10th or a 20th part of what I was drinking before I don't feel any, any need to drink, you know? Yeah, no, that's, that's amazing to hear. And it's, it's, it's this kind of changes, like alcohol, unfortunately, it's like it impacts in so many ways, like it's, of course, it's, it's, it's those calories, what you are taking in, but then also for the next day, like, if you, if you ever try to track your sleep with your. Or or something. I don't know how accurate, but you get pretty good dreams, like if you, especially if you do it more often, how it's impacting to your sleep and and in that way, your next day, you might not feel it that much, but Okay, your recovery, it's it's not starting. It's not able to start. It starts only after both First, your body needs to work to get that alcohol out of it, how it's how it's then at the night, it means that your your heartbeat like I, at least for me, it's like I need to drink one or two beers. Heartbeat is like five beats higher, on average, at night, if it's then more than two beers, if it's 345, then it's like a 10 beats higher. And then, of course, then next day I might I feel it, I'm not well rested. I might sleep. I might fail. You sleep faster. But then that sleep quality, it sucks whole night. And then next day, you are more tired than that. There are in several studies, and I can just with my own experience and from my clients, that feeling like that you are, obviously you are moving less without you don't even notice these things. You are having more gradings. So it's not that when you feel sick that you are, you are, I think it's, it's their study like shows that I think, on average, 300 calories more you are eating, even like with the junk food or or with the fat sweet sweets, when you when you are having and you don't, you are not having a full night of sleep. So it's, and if you do it, then that's more often. It's, it impacts on everything. And it's, it's kind of a negative cycle, or it's really hard. This is also, like you mentioned earlier. It's being honest for yourself and understanding that, okay, this is reality. And if you don't know it, like, this is with with the alcohol i i heard in the past with a couple, like, who really that was a problem. It became happy, like, it's, it's, it's really hard to understand that, if you have a actually a problem. But if you, if you are more than, like, it's several nights per week, even it's only 123, or if it's everyday thing. But if you look total amount per week, what you are consuming and, and there is, I don't know now how many portions it is, but if you look those numbers, they are, they are, there is no kind of healthy way of doing it, but it impacts so much more than we believe, and, and, but it's we are, like you said earlier, that we are so good to kind of Ignore these things like and say that it's not that big a problem. But if you, if someone is telling back that what I love to like, encourage to do is some kind of challenge with yourself that try to call 30 days without and if you can't imagine to call 30 days without alcohol, we have a problem. Yeah, and this is, and it doesn't mean like, if you go the 30 days without, and after that you decide that I'm going back to drinking, then go for it. But just try it. How it feels like when your sleep quality is improving, how you are most likely you are seeing other benefits of also, like, of course, there's that kind of social effect. What is missing, but it's, I think it's, it's also in, in our mind and head, and that we need to, we need to, kind of consume something, because it's not the it's, it's really like that short term benefits, and then you have for those long term bad benefits, exactly. But it is, it sort of the everything gathers around what we have been saying before, and it becomes a bit, I can it becomes a bit this self fulfilling prophecies. Because, yes, I mean, of course, some people, or I'll guess, most of the people, in a moderate way, if you drink it in a moderate way, how cool it will allow you to be a bit more relaxed in certain situations, and to start the conversation a bit easier, and so on and so on. But then the question that one needs to pose to itself, it's, you know, what is really being in during me of doing that without drinking that first glass of alcohol or that beer and so on. So it becomes, again, a very, very much an exercise of self knowledge and insights and about oneself. And this is, I think it's just that the most of us go, go through life without really having the necessity to put themselves in that position, and then those decisions never, never really come. Am into account, at least with alcohol, you know. Do I feel the same without alcohol as I was feeling good before? Absolutely, I feel better. Does it make some situations a bit a bit more, you know? Or should I put a bit odd? Yeah, if, if I go out, or if I'm with with some friends and and then I decide to stop in the first beer, and they continue to the fifth and the sixth and so on. Yeah, the level of conversation that and the wavelength that they're going to be is not the same as mine, and that's pressure, pressure on things, but it's in the in the end of the day, it is about you wanting something and realizing something, what is better for you or not, and not just be a victim of the circumstances of the situations that they happen. So it's a lot of it needs to be this, at least, will to do a positive change. And, you know? Yeah, so alcohol, I actually didn't mention it. And yes, I was drinking before. I'm drinking much, much, much less now what? But I don't also see any reason whatsoever to go back to this, you know, and in my case, it made also, it have consequences by Yeah, how should I say the effect was that, for example, my wife have also decreased their consumption of Apple because I'm not taking the glass of wine and she's not taking what it's also good for her. Then she realized it, and she, she's, she's happy for it. You know, it was nothing that we planned, but it just happened, and it becomes also a very positive effect of it, if we put it like that, no, absolutely. This is there. Is there any like you mentioned this from your wife. Is there any other like with this, your progress like that, how it have affected other areas in your life, like energy levels. How is your cholesterol? Did you check pests or or post personal relationships? Yeah. I mean, so health wise. I mean, my, my blood pressure is, is good. It's normal. Is actually almost, yeah, it's very normal for what it should be. My first role is also a little bit better, and that one is a bit difficult to for me to understand, if it is just the exercise and the diet or if it is because I'm taking the medication for it, but it's better. So absolutely no, no, no doubt. I mean, when it comes to to private life, it has some yet it has some positive effects, because we are influenced by the people around us, right? So if I come and I change my habits in a conscious way that the people around will adapt to it. So my daughter is, she was physically active, but now she maybe takes another another pass to on the week to to run, because again, you you sort of see and that influenced by the people around you, and if those people are a bit more active and doing some sort of my wife comes to to the gym with me quite more often, because instead of being at home and yeah, she just says, Why? Why? Why not? I don't go. I will also follow to the gym. And she and she, she follows that so it has positives in the life and it impacts the people around you in in a positive way, in the same way that I'm impacted by the way that they do things and so on. So it's, it's good. So it's, it's all these positive effects. Yeah, no, this is somebody said it like pretty well, like that. You are average of five people. You spend most time off. And if you in your example, you changed your habits in a healthier one and better one, and now you are impacting your loved ones. You know this, these kind of things, they are actually, for me, they matter more than you know, losing, losing 12 kilos, 13 kilos, but if you are able to improve your blood pressure showing as a father, example for your daughter, getting your wife, getting into a gym and chasing habits like those are. Those are things like, really, what are the most impressive I can I can actually mention also one thing that it was, it was a change. And this, this was, it was difficult to see at the beginning, my my wife, she have been doing for a long time, like maybe six years. She have been doing this intermittent fasting, so where two days per week she was just eating 500 kilo calories, what is easily. Told, you know, I of course, you can do it over a certain time of period, but I will not have that mental strength that she have done it, and she was feeling very comfortable, and he was having a very good impact for her, but she tried to convince me to do it. But again, I was feeling angry those days, and I could not do it. I tried a couple of times and I could not, or I was not motivated enough to do it anyhow, but with the changes of habit, when I change my habits of eating and so on, and so we try not to cook different meals at home. So we eat the same meals, and then we try to, I try always, to portion them in a way that he feels good, and actually she's she's not going up in weight, and she's still feeling good. She's still doing it, but she's not doing it every week, so she's like, what I'm eating, but before, she had difficult to do it because I was eating too much, and then she she felt that pressure that someday she needed to take some days off of that and and doing this intermittent fast. But then right now is we are actually having a much more balanced diet, the three of us term and the and she's just doing the other one. When she her body tells the word, now I should do it, but, and she's not going up in weight or nothing like that. So that is also a very positive change. And she because, even if you have done it for many years, you know, some days either because you are a bit more low on energy or whatever, you know, some days are difficult, and she's as positive that she don't think to do it every week and and so on. So also a positive change that's amazing to hear. So is there, before we wrap up, is there something like, what kind of advice you would give someone who is just starting their weight loss journey, especially someone who is over 40, like, in your case, yeah. I mean, the advice is that, above all you, you sort of, you need to commit to yourself, that you you want to do that, you know it's and someday is going to be easy. Someday is going to be difficult, but you need to have that base commitment that you are doing that for, for your own benefit, and it's something that you need to do, be patient, be forgiven. And one day it's okay to deviate, but over a long period of time, over the week, over the month, you know, be consistent, and believe in those in that consistency, and it's going to happen. And I don't know if I read it somewhere or if I heard it somewhere. I mean, was someone in an article or in a podcast or something that I heard sometime that he compared the human body a bit to a car. So you get your body is like a car that you get, but you just get one in your lifetime, right. And if you decide to maintain the car and take good care of it and not run it too bad and decelerate too much and push it too much, then that car is going to serve you well during those 80 years, 7080, 90 years of your life. And when the car is new, you know, it's much more forgiven. And I'm 46 I don't consider myself old in any way. I think that in many ways I'm I'm in the peak of my life in many ways. But, you know, it's you start seeing those changes happening, and you cannot run the card anymore, like when you were 20. And maybe it's time that you start paying a bit more attention if you want that card to still do the long trips when, when you are still 70 or 60 or 80, and you need I became conscious about that. And maybe I should have became conscious about that when I was 20 or 30, I don't know, but it was now. And so my advice is that, I mean, be conscious that I mean taking good care of yourself is gonna most likely allow you to have when you become older, you have a much higher quality of life, so it's an investment that you are doing in yourself and in your quality of life and with that of the people around you. Do you know, because you'll be able to do things with the with your loved ones and with your friends and with your and not spending those years a little bit, maybe, yeah, with more difficulties. So my advice would be that be, you know, make a contract with yourself. Be and hang on, and things will happen. And maybe they'll take one year or two years to happen, but if you keep that consistency, they will definitely happen, because is, is the biology. And the chemical chemistry of our body is going to push you in the right direction. That's that's there is that is basically the only way in fitness is to fail. How to fail is to give up. So if you completely give up and say that I'm not going to do it anymore, that's the only way. Otherwise, if you keep going, it's only matter of time before you reach your pose. And like you said, it's never too late until you are living, you are breathing. It's not too late. But don't that is, that is the best, best advice, like it's, it doesn't matter how old you are. I would like to refer to things, I mean, I said it before, but very important for me to start with that I needed also some external influence that, in this case, was you, and you supported me quite a lot, a great deal through my journey. But and these sort of learning or conclusion that I came with exercise is very important, and you need to do it because you need to keep the body going, and it will have a lot of positive effects, but especially when it comes to weight reduction. I mean, you can try the crazy diets, you can try all these things that you want to do, but in the end of the day, you need to find what it fits you when it comes to having a healthy, balanced diet. And it seems crazy that, you know, is a 3 billion. It's not 3 billion, I read the numbers, is a crazy amount of money that people that economy around that is with weight loss and so on. It is total in the world. The the form is, is actually pretty simple, but it's something fundamental in in our our brain works on this search for easy calories that right now is not is hindering us of having a healthy life. And you need to realize that it is 80% of it. It is about having a very, very healthy diet. And the healthy diet is not solids and so on. Is a balanced diet. And you balance things that is is a and rho, but then you need to always complement it with a more active life, because otherwise it doesn't work. You just go back to it. You don't get those you don't get the dopamine in the brain working in the way that it should. So you need to rewire yourself a little bit. So that will be my advice. I mean, worked for me again. I was not a believer. And here I am, nine months after. But this is this exactly. I love to do this kind of interview, like now and before and what happened and that story behind, like, because if I would post some before after picture from you, like, like you mentioned those pictures without having actually that story. It's not really relatable. Or you think that the art day, like those, those kind of pictures, they are very easy to, you know, to find from internet or or use some picture like, get some false pictures, or before like, they are very easy to do. But then when you have that kind of story behind and like you said, that you were not big believer of before after pictures, but now, when you see your own picture with that story, what you just told that's amazing. It's possible, and it's not. It's it's a realistically possible. It doesn't mean that you have to really like starving yourself or give up everything and being in some weight loss camp for being that kind of passive to get that kind of results like you have lived your life, had busy life, you have traveled there, you cut off, got off track, but you still were consistent enough. And when you do things consistently enough for longer period of time, it's it's only a matter of time, or you will get, it's guaranteed that you will get results. Is there anything else what you would like to share? Like from chosen if somebody want to contact you, or I know if you are in social media, or anything else what you would like still to share, I'm not in social media like very practical Well, I'm in social media because I follow but I don't post stuff, but I'm just in LinkedIn, and you can share my name. It's not a problem. And if someone would like to speak with me, and absolutely, I'll be more than happy to support someone to make a positive life, life change. No, I even if you you have a bit of difficulty to every time that I try now, you have to give you credit. I still give you a lot of credit. You know, it is you. You spoke to me in a in a way that I could understand. Them in in a way that it was accessible to me to motivate myself to make that change. And it is, it might be that it is like that with with every personal trainer out there, but I'm 46 and you are the first one that I met, tourist that made that impact to me. So I think that you, you should also take quite a lot of credit for, for the positive changes that you have in the people that you, that you come in contact with, and that you train and so on. So because that's, that's the reality of things. So, or at least is my reality of things. But thank you. I really appreciate it. Maybe it's just the mentality. I really struggle to take these kind of credits. Of course, it feels good. I would be lying to not mention it, but it's still, in the end, I always love to think that it's not that I didn't do I do my best what I can to motivate you, but in the end, I haven't done workout for anyone. I didn't eat any salad for you. I didn't eat any protein for you. So you did all your work yourself and and that's why I'm I'm so happy for you, proud of you, what you have accomplished until now, and we'll see where your journey brings you in the future. Very good. So thank you. Thank you Daniel, and talk to you soon. And.