How Jamie Lost 38 lbs in 100 Days Client Results - 140

**Coach Brian Parana:** Welcome to Driven For Health. This is Jamie. This guy is one of my biggest losers, I think, ever. I've been doing this for 23 years, and this guy has dropped more weight in my 100-day fat loss challenge called The Call to Rise. I am blown away by his consistency, his effort. He is a father of a 13 year old, so he wants to show up and lead in front of him and be the man. Right, be the leader and guide his son to what true manliness and masculinity looks like. So, Jamie, welcome to Driven For Health episode one forty. So happy to have you. What's one to three sentences of what you were able to accomplish in our time together in these hundred days? **Jamie:** Listening to you is definitely one thing. You tell me what to eat, balancing my nutrition, keeping my calories at a certain number every day, and water is what really helped me. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah. I know those are the basics, but what did you accomplish? How much weight did you lose in a hundred days? **Jamie:** Well, before my first forty days, I think I lost over thirty pounds. I calculated point seven four pounds first month. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah. Yeah, we're down, what, thirty eight pounds in the hundred days. **Jamie:** Thirty eight, yeah. **Coach Brian Parana:** Just ridiculous. I keep telling you that you're one of the biggest losers that I've had. Andy, episode fifty-three of Driven For Health Podcast — he was also in The Call to Rise. If you want to listen to his podcast episode, then you can totally do that, listener, listening in, to get inspired. And these are real guys eating real food, doing it the right way, right? So Jamie, tell us a little bit about yourself. We know that you work in construction. You got busy days, hardworking days. Tell us a little bit. **Jamie:** It's fifty plus hour days. I travel a lot, work in the heat, I work outside. But I just don't know how to eat. Well, I didn't know how to eat. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah, definitely. And you'd be gone for two, three, four days sometimes in a week, and that would be really challenging. And you would just eat whatever, wherever, whenever, in a sense, and unfortunately just didn't have much of a plan. Now, what were some of the results outside of just the weight loss that you were able to experience in your life? **Jamie:** Well, I'm prepping food, if that's one thing. Instead of, when I do leave, I would just go out to eat and order chicken wings, pizza. I wasn't eating — I was never eating vegetables. **Coach Brian Parana:** Right. Something green was the oregano on top of the pizza, right? Or that little celery that came with the wings, right? **Jamie:** Yeah, no. Celery that came — yeah, this little thing on the side. That's about all the vegetables I got. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yep. And so we had that. We also know that your energy changed quite a bit. How was that from the beginning? You know, maybe talk about some of the sleep challenges that you had in the past, and how some of that, through just better health, changed. **Jamie:** My sleep was horrible. My sleep was, after the weekend, sometimes it was two hours on Sunday and waking up for Monday. And average three to four hours sometimes a day. And in the last month and a half, I think I'm averaging six or better on an average. I have so much more energy, though. I'm waking up earlier, almost half an hour to an hour earlier, literally, and I can just move so much more. Because I drive a lot too, so much more in and out, but just bending over and normal things that you would do as a kid at school, like at recess — how I could just twist, I think. I don't know, but I just have so much more energy throughout the whole day. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah, that is incredible. And you were a self-proclaimed insomniac when we started, and that obviously is a huge issue. But as we started focusing on proper nutrition and getting you quality food, it worked out a lot better. Yeah, we had some digestion issues, right? Some of the challenges there with how you felt in your stomach and other things going on. So what were some of the things that had changed with your digestion because of eating something green occasionally? **Jamie:** A little more control, I think, during the beginning of the day for sure. Just — I don't know. It's just more relief, I think. **Coach Brian Parana:** Less upset stomachs, more relief. **Jamie:** More relief, less gut bloating, it feels like, I guess. Besides the waist size going down. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah, definitely. Right. But it was challenging. You're not the first digestion person I've ever worked with. I've worked with hundreds and hundreds of people. And it's a challenge, because if you eat something, you're not sure how it's gonna react in your body, in your system. If you are out someplace, you don't really always want to have to know where the bathroom's at, in a sense. You don't want it to keep you from being social and interacting and engaging with other people. And those are things that can really weigh you down beside just your body weight — that literally can keep you held back. So it was a huge accomplishment, because you started eating fibrous foods and quality food as well. Now, we've also talked about the other things in your world around happiness and joy, and because you have energy you can actually do things. What are some of the things that you're starting to do again as a result of you dropping like forty pounds? **Jamie:** Just cleaning, real honestly. Just moving around in my house and doing more things. And when I am home, cleaning in my living room, my kitchen, picking things up. Little things, hobbies. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah, we totally called you out on that one. Yeah, there's two things right behind you that you started picking up again. **Jamie:** Yeah, that I'm starting to pick up on a little bit. I'm trying to, at the same time, and it's more relieving. **Coach Brian Parana:** Well, what is it? For the people who can't see it. **Jamie:** There's a couple guitars up there. Those aren't the ones I play, those are just hanging up there. **Coach Brian Parana:** No, for decoration. **Jamie:** But I'm learning, and it's somewhat okay, it's somewhat good. **Coach Brian Parana:** It's really good, right? 'Cause you're doing something other than just work and stay up while you're at home because you can't sleep. **Jamie:** Yeah. **Coach Brian Parana:** Right. That's very, very good. That is so important, is to have the more energy to do more things that you want to do for yourself, and to express yourself in other ways than just work, as an example. I mean, your son gets to see you with more energy and joy and excitement and all this stuff now too, which is wildly beneficial for ya. **Jamie:** Yeah. I can help him. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah. How has that impacted you? **Jamie:** That, I think, is gonna impact me a lot. His mom's a nurse, and she has good quality in that aspect. But I think with me having more knowledge to help out — he's here on the weekends — with how he can eat and have energy 'cause of his activities, that's gonna really, really benefit, I think. And really make us both feel good, or positive. Very positive. **Coach Brian Parana:** Very much so. And you love lifting, and he's starting to get to that prime age where he will want to do that too. I have a sixteen, fifteen, thirteen, eleven year olds, and the thirteen year old is asking me all these workout questions now. And we've done abs together and we've done some workouts together out here in the barn where I'm recording. And it's just really awesome to be able to foster that type of environment for my children, to take care of themselves so that they are healthy, that they are independent, they aren't reliant or low energy or any of this stuff because of just poor eating, or they just don't move their bodies. And that's super, super important. Now, if we think way back when, what have you tried before in the past to lose weight? **Jamie:** Nothing. I fast, and I wouldn't know how. I would just literally eat as little as I could and use up all the energy I had during the day. **Coach Brian Parana:** Just not eat. **Jamie:** And honestly, I had hardly any energy when I get home, and just hardly eat anything too, because I just — it was completely wrong. I was starving myself and wasn't losing weight near as fast either. I was eating way less even, which was weird. Because I think I would just stack it in one night, some, and it would still just be all starchy food or something, and pasta, or I don't know. **Coach Brian Parana:** Calorie-high carb foods. Yep. Or pizza and wings, 'cause they could be made for you. **Jamie:** Yeah. Pizza and wings are bad for you when they're fried and dipped in sauce. That's not good. **Coach Brian Parana:** Mm-hmm. Yeah, when you have four or more slices, or you have over a dozen wings, you're really asking for a lot of extra calories of carbs and fats and stuff, and it really does work against you in that situation. Now, we also think about — what were some of the motivations when you started thinking about this and realizing, I do need to lose weight and I needed to find a better approach on how to do it? **Jamie:** Just the encouragement of the brotherhood that you have on the app was really — I would just go in there and scroll down, and then talk to you all the time and send you things. That helped out a lot. A whole ton. All the information you give is very, very — was very helpful. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah. My job, everyone listening — I can hand you the fish, but I have to teach you how to fish. That's the easiest way to put it. So there's a lot of education, a lot of communication in the process, so that you learn what the heck you're supposed to do, and we find where we need to improve certain skills and abilities, such as like cooking or cleaning in your situation. Those two things were skill sets that you weren't good at, and we had to start to work on them so that the house was clean and then it was easier to cook, and rinse and repeat. And you could take care of yourself a lot easier that way. **Jamie:** That's another energy. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah. And then you get energy from that. So now, was it any other health issues, or the way you felt, the way you looked, that were some of the driving motivations to even reach out for help in the first place? **Jamie:** Just more energy, even less brain fog, and mobility, movements. Just a lot of — I just feel a lot more, I just feel younger, I think, on it. Just younger, I mean. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah, youthful. That's exactly what I was thinking. I mean, could you imagine still sleeping two to five hours most nights? **Jamie:** No. I wouldn't even get up and take a shower. I'd just get up, get dressed, I'm ready in ten minutes, and I get in my car and I drive somewhere. And now it's get up, get in the shower, I pack my bag, I pack my lunch, I prep my food all week, every day. It's totally different. Doing everything totally different, and I've just — feels like I have more time even. **Coach Brian Parana:** Right. Take care of yourself. Yeah. 'Cause we've prioritized it differently, and different things are more important to you these days than ever before, which is super important. Because if you don't take care of your time — everyone only has twenty four hours in a day. That's a finite thing, and we have to manage it well. And that's something that we really, really spend a lot of time, energy and effort to do with you. Yeah, so we got the support. I mean, how many pictures do you think you sent of the meals that you're eating to me in those hundred days? A lot, right? **Jamie:** Dozens and dozens. I sent one pretty much every day, I'm pretty sure. **Coach Brian Parana:** And that was helpful, right? And we did track too. We had some calorie tracking. Now, not everyone that I work with calorie tracks. It really is individually dependent on their skill sets, their desires, their abilities. And with Jamie, we generally could look — we've lost a lot of the weight, for anyone wanting to know the secret — it was generally around 2,000 to 2,500, with varying degrees depending on how much he moved, because he does have a laborsome job and he does need more calories than maybe someone who's at a desk job, obviously. And then we figured out balanced meals. And one of the coolest things that I would say is that you ate a lot of canned vegetables. **Jamie:** Yep. **Coach Brian Parana:** And why? Because of convenience, right? It was easy for you to be able to prepare them and get them and have them available, or even travel with them. And that was a very unique piece of what we've done versus what other people have done with me. And I just want to call that out, that what we do is we look for sustainable outcomes and behaviors that can be repeated time and again. And for Jamie, having canned peas as an example, or canned green beans or something, can be super easy. And you'd be like, well, what about the sodium? Well, there's way less sodium in a can of peas than there is in fast food McDonald's french fries. Like, way less. So let's not worry about it. We can rinse them off and just eat them, but they're accessible and they are convenient to allow for easier food prep. Now, what was one of your favorite meals that you have had quite a bit in our time? **Jamie:** My favorite — chicken thighs are amazing. They're so much easier to cook, 'cause they're juicier. So I still have those every day for lunch. I'll have two chicken thighs at least. Sometimes three. If I can't get a big breakfast in, can of peas, and I'll have a cup of rice or potato. That's what I've been doing. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yep, yep. So I didn't grill chicken breast all the time, but we found chicken thighs. If you look at a nutritional label, yes, it has slightly more fat and a little less protein than chicken breast, but not so much so that you have to exclusively eat chicken breast to be successful. That's just not real, and it's really important for people to hear that. And that's what we did. We looked at food for what it really is, and then helped you determine how to compare it up with other foods and portion it out to make it the right amount of calories or protein or carbs or fats. And whenever you had questions about it, you just asked. **Jamie:** And it would keep me full and have energy. **Coach Brian Parana:** Which was good. Yeah, you didn't starve losing thirty eight pounds, right? **Jamie:** No, no, I did not, honestly. No. I saved money, I ate more, in my opinion. Man, I used to spend — **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah, let's go over that money thing. How much money did you save? **Jamie:** Over two hundred dollars probably a week, because I'd buy food, because I travel. So I'd stop at a gas station and buy lunch. Or I'd go out and dinners. And now I'm spending under a hundred bucks a week almost, or just at a hundred. I'm probably saving a hundred to two hundred dollars a week in the last three months. I mean, I'm doing it right now still. I'm packing, and I just cooked my whole week's worth of lunch and dinner today, and I'm just getting done. It's definitely worth it, because I saved a lot of money. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yes. Yeah, very much so. Tons of money. And you basically paid for your time in the program, which was really nice and helpful, right? So that's how that works. So all right, now, what were some of the challenges that we had to figure out? Well, money was one of [them], right? So we reallocated the money that you had been spending and spent it toward education and coaching and support. **Jamie:** Could you repeat that? **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah. One of the biggest challenges that you had was the money. And as soon as I'd said, hey, we're gonna reallocate it better, then you were able to — you found the money to be able to then afford the program and the coaching and the support. **Jamie:** Yeah. Yeah, which — yeah. **Coach Brian Parana:** And for the love, if you didn't do this, it would be really bad, right? Again, going back to sleeping not a lot and all that stuff. **Jamie:** It would — I'd feel fifty again. Honestly. No. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah, yeah. And you don't have to feel that so much. Yeah, which is great. **Jamie:** I feel awesome. I feel awesome and I feel knowledgeable. I feel like this is a huge step and a huge leap for me, for what I wanna know and what I want for my future. **Coach Brian Parana:** Right, right. So if you were talking to someone in a similar situation — you know, think of even yourself before, a month before that we met — what would you tell them, if you're wondering if you should get some coaching or support? What would you tell them? What advice would you give them? **Jamie:** I would definitely tell them to try it, if they have the opportunity. It's a no brainer, that if people are out there that are knowledgeable and are seriously doing [this] — if you just listen to them and take the encouragement and the community and the help, and, you know, I'm not really good with words, but it works. It's just flat out, yes. **Coach Brian Parana:** Yeah. Flat out. Flat out it works. And we see this again, Jamie. You are literally one of the biggest losers that I've had in my twenty-three year career in this type of a time frame, which is phenomenal. And we did it by eating whole foods, balanced, through educating you, giving you the support where you needed it, when you needed it the most, and being able to just do one pound at a time. In a sense, that's all we did, and it just happened that you were able to drop it quite a bit. And still maintain your strength, and you are actually burning fat so that you can see muscle, because you did work out too in this time frame, besides just moving all day with your job. And that is so important. So if someone's inspired by Jamie, or any of the other episodes — there's probably about, I don't know, 20 or 30 by now episodes, and there's still plenty more that aren't even on this podcast, that I have recorded with other people that are on my YouTube channel or on thecalltorise.com website. And there's so many people that we did it the real way. We didn't find hacks or fads or fasting or shots or any of that stuff. Literally education around how you move, what food you eat, and how to practice better portion control in your everyday life so it was sustainable. That's what the Call to Rise program is. It's a 100 day fat loss challenge. We have five pillars. The first one is the Call. It's about identity, about who you are as a man and stepping up into that version, the best version of yourself. Because you can't operate this busy, crazy, fast paced life without it. You are left behind. The second one is the Forge. The Forge is the exercise piece, the movement piece. We figure out an individual plan that's going to work for you and your busy schedule. The third one is the Fuel. This is eating the right foods at the right times in the right amounts. Super important to understand that. And that is probably about 80-ish percent of what we do, right? There's so much food nutrition that we talk about, because that's where it matters most. The fourth one is the Code. It's the mindset, the way you think. Jamie thinks differently. And that's what is empowering to know — that he has lost weight and he will be able to keep it off, because I got him to think differently, to view food differently, have a different perception and relationship with it. And last is the Brotherhood. This is a powerful one, of being around like-minded individuals. Most people don't have a Brian in their social circle. I am a leader around health, fitness, nutrition, especially with the people that I come in contact with. I mean, literally this is my career that I have been doing for 23 years. So I champion that leadership role in getting you to rise up in your standards and do better for yourself. That, and then you have other guys that are in the program as well. They are juggling busy time, stress, energy, all the things, not knowing what to eat. They're all juggling these things in life that they have to figure out if they want to lose the weight and maintain it. And that's thecalltorise.com. Check it out. All right, Jamie. Thank you so much for showing up and doing it. That's half the battle. And you did it every single day. And now we are paying dividends on that stuff. So we still have a little ways to go, but that's okay. And that's what we're going to be working on continuously moving forward with you, so that you are happier, you're healthier, and you start attracting even more of what you want in your day to day life. So that's all that we have today. Thank you for joining Jamie and I and sharing in his pretty epic weight loss journey here in the Hundred Day Challenge. Thank you. **Jamie:** Thank you.