Today we’d like to introduce you to Lauren O’Briant.
Hi Lauren, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
My journey started when I’d hit rock bottom in my wellness. I’d never really learned about nutrition growing up and developed extreme eating behaviors as a result of this lack of knowledge and heightened temptation of all the processed foods that are so easily accessible. Due to many personal factors, I went into a deep depression and turned to food for comfort. Abuse of this low-quality, highly-addictive food aided in the downfall of my health. I realized I’d put on 100 lbs in excess weight due to these terrible eating habits, no real nutrition knowledge, and no support outlet. Rather than accept my fate as a miserable, morbidly obese 30-year-old woman now battling high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and risk for diabetes, I decided to fight back. I turned to social media as an outlet to share my story and find support from other women going on a similar weight loss journey. I was terrified to post the vulnerable things – pictures of me with my shirt off, my starting weight, struggles, etc., but the women who gravitated toward me lifted me with love and support. It created this virtual community of acceptance, understanding, and triage of cheerleaders ready to pick me up on my hard days. My starting weight was 263 lbs; I am down 46 lbs now and counting! I achieved this through the independent, vicious study of nutrition, and I quickly realized that the root cause of my problem was poor gut health. I had an allergy to gluten and dairy, which is very common today. I started by cutting these foods out and noticed an immediate change in my body composition, even though the scale hadn’t moved much. It was due to a reduction in bodily inflammation. This fascinated me! So, I began to dig deeper and learned more about overall gut health and how this can often be a root cause of why we put on weight and struggle to get it off. I dug deeper and decided to go vegan on July 1, 2022, which changed my life even more. More and more inflammation started to leave my body, and I incorporated gut health tips and tricks into my journey, and the weight started to melt off.
Now my Instagram page of nearly 40,000 followers is wholly devoted to sharing my ongoing journey and helping women get their results by becoming knowledgeable and empowered on their weight loss journeys, learning the root cause of their wellness issues, and breaking the chains of diet culture. I am currently in the process of becoming a Certified Gut Health Specialist, and I plan to dive even deeper into this topic to cover all things gut health, something the health industry needs to discuss more.
Next in my business is launching my wellness blog on March 28, 2023, at www.curvytofitspo.com, where I will be able to serve my followers and new readers better looking for inspiration and support on their wellness journeys and launching a course in the summer of 2023 for women to get their complete toolkit of everything they need to heal their guts, lose the weight, and take back control of their lives – once and for all!
Can you talk to us about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned? Looking back, would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
I think my lack of knowledge initially made it hard to understand the right course of action initially. There is so much crap shoved on you from the diet industry. They push keto and Weight Watchers, and all these things that I truly believe are just band-aid solutions to the real problem – poor gut health.
Poor gut health is facilitated by and maintained by poor food choices and regularly consuming food known to cause inflammation in the gut. So, if the diet industry is teaching you to count calories, macros, or points, it’s not teaching you about the power of these food choices you’re making, the impact of those, and what’s happening inside your body once you do. I tell my followers that weight loss is often a byproduct of healthier choices, so they become nutrient-seekers rather than calorie-avoiders.
As you know, we’re big fans of Curvytofitspo LLC. What can you tell our readers who might need to be more familiar with the brand?
I just started my own business, Curvytofitspo LLC, in South Carolina. My business aims to provide value in the health and wellness space to teach and empower women to take back control of their weight loss journey by understanding and correcting the root cause of the problem – gut health.
There are 3 pillars of this business – my social media presence, my blog, and my upcoming course – all designed to provide you with the exact roadmap I used to heal my gut, lose 46 lbs, and count on my 100 lb weight loss journey.
I’m proud of my brand because this isn’t coming from someone who is rocking 6-pack abs who have never personally struggled with their weight or the confusion that comes from diet culture and not understanding why all the other forms of weight loss out there aren’t working for them. I know exactly what it’s like to be in your shoes – addicted to food, struggling with binge eating, feeling lost, stuck and alone in a body that feels like a prison. I’m telling you, that doesn’t have to be the end of your story. These tools, tips, and tricks I provide on my social media, blog, and the upcoming course is the key to unlocking that prison and unleashing the inner you that’s been there all along.
What quality or characteristic do you feel is most important to your success?
Consistency – in everything, your body, like people in general, really blossoms understructure and a routine. So the path you utilize to lose weight needs to be something you can see yourself sticking to long-term. If you hate counting calories or weighing your food, you shouldn’t do that to try and lose a quick 10 lbs. Why? Because you stop doing it, go back to your old ways of eating, and then enter the dreaded yo-yo diet phase of your life. Be realistic, and consistent, fall in love with the process, and the weight will come off.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.curvytofitspo.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/curvytofitspo/
