Ep. 116 Getting Out of Survival Mode w/ Sarah Hotchkiss

Sarah Hotchkiss is the owner of  catalyst wellness coaching located right in downtown Janesville, WI. With over 25 years in the field she focuses on helping women reverse symptoms of autoimmune disease, chronic pain, GI disorders and assists with healthy whole food weight loss using custom meal plans and grocery  lists.   Sarah is a licensed family therapist with a 20 year background as an executive in one of the largest not for profits in the state as well as a nutritionist specializing in functional blood chemistry and data driven health plans. She resides with her husband and two teenagers in Janesville and loves interior design, summer pool relaxation and has 3 cats.  

https://www.catalystwellnesscoaching.com/

https://www.catalystwellnesscoaching.com/catalystblog

https://www.catalystwellnesscoaching.com/shop

https://www.catalystwellnesscoaching.com/testimonials

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Kimberlyn: . [00:00:00] hey there. If you're anything like me, you've been told your whole life how to do things. How to parent better how to work smarter. These five tips to get more done in less time. And get your exhausted, trying to do it all, fit it all in. What if you dropped the shuts and tuned back into what. You know, to be true. What, if you were able to determine what works best for you and follow it with no shame and no guilt. Hey, I'm Kimberlyn

Christina: And I'm Christina. We're two work from home mamas following our passions while balancing families. We believe in you and the life you've dreamed of. We believe you can have it all without sacrificing yourself in the process.

And we believe that you are ultimately the expert on how to live your life. This podcast is here to inspire, challenge, and support you as you design your own strategies for parenting and productivity. 

All right. Well welcome to another episode of Parenting and Productivity by Design. I'm Christina. I'm here flying solo today. Kimberlyn's under [00:01:00] the weather, but I'm excited because we have Sarah Hotchkiss here. And Sarah and I met just kind of randomly. I reached out to you. I'd heard a lot about the work that you do and was just interested in connecting.

So you're the owner of Catalyst Wellness Coaching. And you really work with. Families with women, with children, with men, like you, you kind of run the gamut, but what you really do is you help them with symptoms of autoimmune, if they're having nutrition issues even just like weight loss stuff, but you really work on like individually crafting an overall sustainable nutrition plan.

Absolutely. Like, yeah, you nailed it. Yeah. Primarily I would say, I'd say 70% of the people I work with are middle aged women. You know, who are professionals, have kids at home, busy feeling crazy like we both are probably. And, a lot of these symptoms maybe they had earlier in life or maybe they didn't, but things are really creeping up and it's really getting in the way of them [00:02:00] living a quality life.

So yeah, primarily a lot of autoimmune GI is definitely my wheelhouse. So I do a lot of blood chemistry and some stool testing, a lot of those things to get it, that kind of the root cause of some of that stuff. And then nutrition is basically at the core of, of what I do, nutrition, lifestyle changes some supplements, vitamins I do work You know, connect well, I get referrals from chiropractors, functional medicine docs, and then people, their regular doctors, you know, rheumatologists, things like that to work in concert with other professionals to be able to sort of finally sometimes fix something that maybe has been nagging at you for 20 years, but it's really, really come to an head.

And so probably the number one thing that people come to me with, no matter what they're coming with, you know, people come with this long laundry list of things is fatigue. Everybody's just tired. You know, so then you're just barely taking one step in front of the other to you know, to feel better.

And you, the idea of sustainability or batch cooking or doing something ahead of time is just like not even in the realm for you at that point. [00:03:00] Cause you're just kind of in survival mode. So I call that the iced coffee and wine mode. So, cause I see that with women a lot, they're pounding the caffeine during the day, cause they're so tired and then they can't, but then they can't fall asleep.

And so then they're having a glass of wine or taking Benadryl or, you know, NyQuil or something to sleep. And then it's that cycle like over and over again. So but yeah, that's primarily who I'm working with. 80 percent of my people are pretty local. Janesville, Beloit, Madison, kind of surrounding area.

I do work with people, out of state, out of the area. I've even had a few out of the country. I get a handful of referrals from like California and Florida, because there must not be access to the same services. And I think they're also a lot more expensive in that area. So I think people see my rates in Wisconsin are like, Oh yeah.

I prefer to work with people in person, but I absolutely can do the whole thing via, you know, zoom if needed. So, Sarah, can we go back just a little bit and can you talk about like, how did you get started doing this? What was. What was the kind of push [00:04:00] for you to get moving in this direction? And then what did that look like?

Because you weren't, you weren't doing stuff on your own before. So like, how did that progression happen? Right. I think I've always been an entrepreneur at heart. I was working for Lutheran soul services for 20 plus years. Really as an entrepreneur within that umbrella though. And so I've had, you know, two decades of business experience.

And I, you know, I was overseeing a 15 million book of business with, you know, it and HR and managers and the whole deal. And so in fact, like starting my own business. in some ways was interesting because it was kind of just me. You know, I had to kind of bring that all down. I was used to doing big things.

And so I am a licensed therapist, nutritionist, you know, I have certifications in autoimmune and GI diets and blood chemistry and all these things. So I started for many years doing direct service and working with families in that social services, health and social services realm, not really wildly different than [00:05:00] what I'm doing now, but then just grew with the company and you know, was in a leadership role managing and continuing up to the executive role for, for quite a few years towards the end.

But I have always struggled with What I know now to be small intestinal bacterial overgrowth methagenetic is the, it's the type that I have. There's three types. I didn't really know that. I just know I didn't feel good. I had brain fog and significant fatigue, which people laugh when I tell them that, because I think when I meet with people and the way that I present, I probably look fine and don't look tired, but on the inside I am.

But I think as women, we just sort of push through things. And so some of those. Disease states are very silent and they're very hidden and we don't talk about them, you know, very much. I was always bloated, you know, GI stuff. And so had tried kind of traditional methods of doing things. And I think 20 years ago, I finally hooked up with a naturopath locally in town who isn't practicing anymore, but between her and I, we kind of figured out what was going on with me.[00:06:00] 

And I then recognized, I didn't really know what normal felt like until I got better until I treated my. Bacterial overgrowth. And so I think not feeling good is probably what propelled me to have the idea in my head. I've had the idea in my head for years, even when I was working for LSS of maybe, maybe when I retire, I'll do this, you know, I'll do something different or whatever, and I didn't have the.

You know, urge to leave there or anything. And I wasn't unhappy. Although it was getting a lot to manage, especially with traveling, I was traveling a lot and that was one of the triggers for my GI disease was traveling, it just stressed my body out and just made everything worse. And though, and then, you know, as you know, like eating and I wasn't really, I never really eat fast food or junk.

I've always eaten pretty well, but I think eating on the road is always tough, even if you pack your own lunch. I'm working, moving forward in the next year or so, working on publishing a book, but one of the chapters is called Sloppy Joes on I [00:07:00] 94. That was probably the moment that I was like, what am I doing?

I can't do this anymore. You know, I'm wearing white pants. I'm trying to eat. a cold sloppy joe on 994, which is not very yummy. But I was going to an all day work meeting in Eau Claire. So that would mean a 13 hour day. I had to drive up there. And of course I would always drive back so I could be home with my kids at night.

I wouldn't grab a hotel. A lot of other people grab hotels and and I would drive back and forth, you know, if needed. And

I was having food reactions to a lot of the, you know, they'd order out food at all these meetings and I was. I would never feel good doing that. So I always would make my own food and also try to be health conscious and, and all those things. And so I had put together like a sloppy show on a gluten free bun and some carrots.

And I thought, well, I'll just eat that on the way up there. And then I don't have to cause a scene eating something different. And people were always asking me questions during the lunch breaks. Cause a lot of times I was presenting and so I didn't get to eat anyways. And so then, you know, [00:08:00] your body's in that, that fight or flight kind of stage, I think all the time.

And, but I didn't have time to stop and microwave it somewhere. Nor had I thought about heating it up before I left. I just like shoved it in a bag. I don't know what I was thinking. And I remember thinking this tastes gross and then I spilled it on my white pants, but I didn't have anything to take it.

You know, it's just like you show up just kind of like a hot mess. And, or at least I felt I did like, I don't think anybody even noticed, but I just remember thinking this is all too much. I think trying to deal with traditional Western medicine for me was probably the most frustrating thing. It still is.

Both through my clients and I'm pretty checked out of that these days. Personally, I haven't had a, I haven't seen a family practitioner myself or haven't needed to in probably 13 years, but a lot of the stuff I can do myself now, which is great, but I was very disappointed and frustrated with how I was treated and how my condition was treated and nobody really knew much about it, even though it's not really that new of a thing.

For sure. 20, you know, now [00:09:00] it's, It's definitely progressed. I can get people tested for it and tons of things now, but 20 years ago for sure. And I think when people looked at me, they saw sort of the epitome of health, but I inside, I felt awful. And I just wasn't really given a lot of help. Of course, drugs suggested and pain medications and antidepressants and like all that stuff.

And I didn't, most of that I didn't do. And naturopath was probably the best thing that kind of propelled me forward to figure out some of my own stuff. And I always had this thought in my mind, like, I'm going to help somebody else with this someday. And I don't know when or how, but that's what I'm going to do.

And so maybe about eight years ago, 2015, 16, somewhere in there, I started, I went to target and I saw this orange journal that said, trust your crazy ideas. And it spoke to me and I bought it and it was 8. And every time I had a crazy idea, I wrote it down. Every time I had a thought for what is now [00:10:00] became my business plan.

I wrote it down and that orange journal of like random stuff written down became, became a written business plan at some point in about 2018. So in 2018, I was still with the company and they were doing some reorganizing. And so In the meantime, then six months prior, I decided to go back to school through primal health coach Institute and get my nutrition degree because I thought, well, someday I think I'm going to use this and I don't know when.

And so I went back to school full time while I was working full time and had kids. That was interesting and Completed that. And then I just kind of had it and I didn't know when I was going to use it. And then round about the same time that following year, then there was a big reorganization and I was asked to keep my same job.

But go to Eau Claire. I told you I was traveling to Eau Claire a lot. They're like, we really need you in Eau Claire. And we had just built this beautiful [00:11:00] house in the country in Janesville. We own another business in town. I wasn't moving. So had to make the tough choice to leave. And so then I left there and probably we gave it like kind of four or five weeks for me to trans out, transition out of my role.

And I left there on a Friday, then the end of September, and then Monday, I believe it was October 2nd, I literally opened my website, my business, did my first booth, got my first client, just rock and roll. So looking back, I might've wanted to take a couple weeks break in between there, but I think I was financially nervous of how that, you know, how that might go.

So I think getting the wrong answers and feeling like crap. And I wasn't really connected with other people that had similar feelings or conditions. I was connected with a wide range of professional women, of course, but that wasn't something we talked about a lot. You know, we talked business. A lot of my friends didn't have issues like that.

And so I think it was not feeling great and then wanting to help other people [00:12:00] with that. And I've always been in the helping profession. And so that was, I was no stranger to that. So Sarah, I When you started, so you're like, okay, I quit my job on Friday. I started some on Monday. I like got my website out, got a client, got this thing.

Like, did it come super easy? So then you just started your business and then you're profitable and then you're great. And you're pulling in all these clients and you're doing all this stuff. I mean, let's like, let's actually talk about how this happened because that's the expectation. A lot of times from people, it's like, if I'm following my dreams, I'm doing my passions.

Like it should all just kind of line up and be easy. Can you talk about what your experience was like? I'm not going to lie. Parts of it were very easy for me. Starting the business was actually a piece of cake for me because I had been running larger businesses in the business acumen for decades.

And so that piece was not difficult for me. I had my husband helped me with the website. Developing content was cake for me. The technology piece was hard as you and I were just talking about before we started recording. I had him help me with that, but. Man, [00:13:00] profit and loss statements, financial projections rates, like all of that I could do in my sleep.

The content the, you know, I had been a therapist for 25 years, so that working with people wasn't a big deal. Forms, all of that, like, wasn't, that wasn't too big of a deal. Even like, I didn't even start with QuickBooks or any of that. We start with Excel spreadsheets, but most of the elements of running a business I was very comfortable with I just had to kind of kick it down a notch because it wasn't a 15 million business, not even close still isn't and won't be, and I don't want it to be.

So the other thing is, I think people see that maybe I ended work on a Friday and opened my business on Monday, but what you didn't see is that I've been writing in that journal for three years and that I behind the scenes had gotten the second degree that took me a while, like nights from 10 PM to midnight is when I did.

It's, you know, the online piece of it. And after my family went to bed, I'd sit in my pajamas and make it happen cause it was quiet and free from distractions and I'm a night owl [00:14:00] anyways. And so 10 to midnight was like the perfect time for me. And no, it was a slow start though. I mean, yes, I got a client sign up right away on that Monday.

And I thought, oh, and it was like. I don't know, 1, 100 or something. And I was like, yay, you know, but I had put so much money into investing on the bid. I mean, I was, you know, in the red already because I had invested in setting up a website and a business and rent and, you know, all those things. Cause I do have a, a lot of people in the nutrition business don't have physical brick and mortar space.

And I do, and I prefer it. And because I work local, that's, that's kind of my jam. A lot of people are doing stuff online, but. So behind the scenes, though, for six months prior to opening the doors, I was running focus groups. I was developing strategy. I was doing research. I was putting together intake forms.

You know, website was pretty much done, but I was kind of doing all the work that led up to having a successful open. I had a Just a booth at a yoga studio where I had the space that was kind of where I was at. And so we had kind of an open [00:15:00] house with all the practitioners that were in that space. It was sort of a wellness studio at the time.

It is no longer, but and yeah, it just kind of felt right and went well, but I was, so that was 2019. And so you're slow to start, right. I maybe had a couple of people sign up with me in the first three months. And then COVID hit. And so here I am a really new business and really not a lot of people know about me.

And I had left my close to six figure job and was like, yeah, let's do this. And then everybody stayed in their homes for months on end. And I recorded contact content. You know, on Facebook and did some 21 day groups and some other things, group things aren't really my jam. I've learned that I've run tons of groups.

I like the energy, but I really have my best results with people one on one. And so that's primarily what I do. And so it took a bit, but I would, so, so that first year, just to be like, super candid that first year in 2020, I made 5, [00:16:00] 000 the whole year. I sold probably 18 to 20, 000 worth of services. So people were purchasing things.

But my, you know, your overhead is you still have, you know, minimum overhead. And so a couple of grand a month still, you know, I have, and I think sometimes people forget about that piece too, when they work with you for an hour session and they're like, wait, how much do you charge an hour? Oh, you may, you know, and it's like, no, you can throw a 70 percent on out the window.

I think I told you that when we met and I make what's left over. And so there's a lot of work that goes into that. I'm pretty organized. I'm a big planner. I had these thoughts in my head for years. And so it was just getting it onto paper and putting it together. I'm also not afraid to wing stuff and have it not be perfect.

Consistency over perfection. And so I just kind of like jumped out of the gate and did it and figured it out. As I went and I had done that for decades at LSS with program development stuff. And so I was honestly pretty comfortable. I'm a, I'm an achiever. I like excellence. I like things done right.

And so, but if I can hit 80 percent out of the gate, then you kind of [00:17:00] figure out at, you know, as you go, I also was charging way less at the beginning too, you know, as I kind of figured it out too. So that's kind of how it, you know, got going and it grew and blossomed since then, I think the second year I'm, I gross income brought in three times as much as I did the first year.

Which was still not like a ton of money, but it was like, I remember that was the year, year two, which is great. Cause most people it takes like three to five years. And so especially with the program I graduated from typically three to five years. So by year two, I was like, Hmm, I think this is going to work.

This is going to be something. I could sort of pay my bills with what I was netting, you know, each month I could pay her mortgage and whatever it was tight, but it was like, okay, it was a way less than I was making before probably a third, but it was, it was like, okay, I'm like, this is like a salary, you know, I think when I figured it out, I was probably making 18 an hour the second year, but I thought, but this is like reasonable at least, you know, to start from, and then it's just kind of grown and blossomed.

[00:18:00] Since then, I did some group programs. I do I'm connected with Fullscript and Online Dispensary so I can do supplements and vitamins and protein powders and you can even get toothbrushes on there. I do that. I'm working on an app. So, you know, kind of lots of different things. I started kind of a side hustle at the doctor's office in town here.

It's called the doctor's office. It's a cash pay primary care clinic on the south side. And so I'm still there once or twice a week or so depends summer, not as much, but and I can do still primarily like mental health there and it can also do nutrition. And so those connections kind of helped, you know, get me going too.

One of the things when we had chatted before that I was just thought was so smart of you and really like tapping into that was building that network and like the referrals and the, the way that you're able to work with. And be able to have like your specialized area that you do, but also being able to work with other people that do complimentary [00:19:00] services.

How did you start to develop that and how has that helped you in creating this business and in like, Just overall for your clients, like their results? Yeah. I mean, when you sign up with me, you get me and then a network of everyone that I know. I'm naturally fairly extroverted. I think, honestly, I have, one of the places that I formed probably really good connections is just at the local gym that I go to.

I've been there 24 years. I mean, you get to know people there and people in the business. People, not people needing help. You know, I don't sort of advertise it or anything, but people got to know what I was doing. And so honestly I was used to doing this at LSS too. It really is just networking with people.

It's, it's, it's setting up meetings with people. It's what you did to me. I mean, it's just reaching out saying, Hey, I heard about you. Let's talk. That's all I was doing. You know, I already had a naturopath. I had a massage therapist. I knew I had a chiropractor I'd been working with. I had, you know, just sort of all these people in my life because I had people sort of providers in my life that I needed to survive and [00:20:00] get by.

And so it was just starting with them. Setting up booths, places, doing coffee with people, you know, just kind of connecting and sort of, and I continue to build those networks, but I spent time even before I opened my doors a lot of time, just making those Connections. I set up a business Facebook page, of course, then right away, like separate from my personal one, one to keep boundaries.

And so that grew fairly quickly. A thousand, 2000 followers, I think, you know I don't really care how many followers I have actually, you know, by the way, really, it's really just about engagement and who needs help. But I'm not really into the numbers in that regard. I'm into kind of the quality piece, but it really is just thinking ahead and building that network ahead of time.

And it really was just, meeting with people hanging out and saying, here's what I'm doing. What are you doing? How can I help you? Here's some of my information and, and that's it. It's, it's pretty, it's nothing complicated, honestly. Well, and I think that, I mean, this probably comes pretty naturally too as well, but maybe even having that time where like, Covid was happening, people weren't doing these [00:21:00] things.

Like you're having to kind of look at different opportunities because one of the other things that I know is that you're known pretty well locally. Like I'll talk to people and ev and your name will come up in just general conversations. And I think one of the testaments to that is the work that you do in the results that you get, like the, the clients doing it, but you are also.

actively engaged in local groups, in answering questions, in being a resource. And I think that as we talk to like, people will kind of contact you sometimes be like, okay, nope, you know, like I'm ready. I've seen you doing things. I've like, I know you're, I know you're, you're stuff now. Like I haven't really interacted necessarily with you at all.

But I'm noticing the things that you're doing and I'm ready to work with you. Yeah. I get that. All right. People hear people say like, I feel like I really know you I'm ready, you know? And so a lot of people that decide to kind of make the jump to work with me. I, it's not really a [00:22:00] long initial phone call.

They're like, you know, I'm talking to, I do this and this and they're like, yeah, I know I'm let's go, you know? Yeah. You know, I've been a member at a yoga studios locally. And so you make connections there. The gym, like I said, I'm at the athletic club. I have been on the executive board of Basics Cooperative for quite a few years, and I've been shopping there for probably 20 and so you make a lot of connections there, and I think it's, it's literally like, my husband always makes fun of me.

We go grocery shopping together. I mostly do it, but he'll come with me, and he's like, can you just get your food and leave? Like, can you just? Like I don't you, how do you talk to people? And a lot of times I'm not even initiating the conversation, but sometimes I'll see somebody struggling to pick out like spaghetti sauce and I'll be like, oh, I really like this one.

This one doesn't have garlic and onion. Like if you have GI issues, you could use this one. Like the sensitive formula. Oh, I don't, you know. And so I think naturally, especially at basics, I just am, you know, and I kind of know that store in the back of my head by now. So like, I'm. I'm helping people that are reaching out or [00:23:00] somebody, but people recognize me in town, I think.

And so then they won't ask a question. And a lot of times I just get somebody that sends me a message on like messenger or an email and just says, I don't feel good. I don't know all the things they do. I have no idea, but like, I trust you to help me. I just want to feel better. You know, I'm tired and bloated.

I've gained weight. I've joined pain. I have headaches all the time. I'm on the, I'm on a statin, I'm on a blood pressure med. I'm 45 and I feel like I'm 80, you know? So I get a lot of that. And I say, you don't have to know all the things like that's why you hire me is to figure it out with you. Sometimes often people don't come to me with any medical diagnosis or any, I'll say like, what's your significant mental history there?

I don't, I don't really have anything. Then they make this long list of things. Sometimes I'm working with their doctor to help them get a diagnosis and that can be very validating for people. And it was validating for me too. I'm like, I'm not crazy. Like, I don't think everybody feels like this. And so working [00:24:00] with their medical doc or having, and I'll send them to the doctor's office where I'm at.

So I think outside the box, sometimes that can be really helpful. And then we know kind of what. You know, to do with it and what eating style is going to work and, and, and sleep and like, you know, all those things. So I think all those things are important. So let's talk about that a little bit more too, because I do think that that is something that's.

is that trigger, right? So I, like you said, like 70 percent of your people that you work with are women, they probably have been living in a state of stress, living in a state of fatigue, like not being able to listen to their body. They don't get the answers from, from traditional medicine. What are some of the signs that they can look for in terms of like, maybe this isn't?

Just how you are, or maybe it's not that you're just tired. Maybe you have something else going on. And then what are some steps that they can take to just like. Get started because I feel like this can feel like a really overwhelming process for people. Yeah, I always tell people when they start to work with me to [00:25:00] leave the how by the door and let me do the how for them for a little while and then long term I'm going to teach you how to do the how.

I mean, I typically tend to work with people from anywhere from three months to a year. Because they usually have not just one thing going on or it's one thing. And then it catapults into all these other things. Oh yeah. By the way, I have headaches every day or I'm having irregular cycles or, you know, whatever, cause I help people with hormone stuff too.

But I think. You know, on your own, like if you're not working with me, if I had to pick one place to start, you probably would think it's food, but it's not. It's actually sleep. If you are not sleeping well and you got to figure out why. And I know a lot of, you know, a lot of people, like I said, we'll pop a Benadryl or NyQuil.

And sometimes I'll ask people on intake, how do you sleep? They'll, and cause I've done a lot of their medical history and I'm like, Oh, they got a lot going on. They, I bet you they don't sleep well. And they'll say well, Oh, I sleep great. You know, and I'm like, well, okay, well, that's good. That's interesting.

But then I go to their list of medications and they're [00:26:00] taking four Benadryl a night. Oh, well. So when you don't take the Benadryl, how do you sleep? Oh, awful. I don't know. I have no idea. I've been doing that for years. I'm like, so you're not really sleeping great. You're just kind of forcing yourself to sleep.

So I think I tend to work with Women in that perimetopause transition too. And so that's when all of a sudden it just, I mean, that happened to me too. I think it I'll be 50, but at 47, I always slept pretty well, light sleeper, but always slept well. And all of a sudden I couldn't, I couldn't fall asleep.

And so, you know, often we know that to be the dip in progesterone levels. And so once we know that, then we can do something about it. Lots of different options there, but I think if people, if you can sleep better, cause if you don't sleep well, you have sugar cravings. You're tired. So then you reach for caffeine, then you reach for so much caffeine.

You can't sleep by the time 10 or 11 o'clock rolls around. So then you're reaching for something else whether it be alcohol or sedatives or whatever, even it's over counter stuff. And you, your fight [00:27:00] or flight is higher. You're just operating in a state of chaotic stress. You probably got up late because you felt like you needed to sleep longer.

And then you probably didn't make great healthy food choices either. Because you're just kind of trying to get by through the day and then not sleep well, get up and do it all over again. So sleep would be my numero uno.

Okay, so when you were doing this, like you have kids, you have a husband who runs an organization too, you're building a business and you have all this knowledge of like, sleep is important. Nutrition is important. How is it that you are able to, like, how did that balance look like of like, I'm trying to do this.

I'm working on, like, I'm working all day. I'm working on my business from 10 to 12 every night. And I know that I need to make sure that I get sleep. I know that I need to address like my own health things. I have kids at home. Like how, what did that back end look like for you? Busy, a [00:28:00] little messy. Again, I'm pretty organized.

So it was sort of like, I know I'm going to do this. So let's make a plan to have it work. I think what helped me too, is that I made that jump from my sort of that traditional corporate nonprofit world when my kids were a little bit older. I think that helped too, because then I wasn't juggling childcare too.

So let's see, I gotta do the math. My kids will be. I guess they were like 11 14, you know, like middle school age when I was doing that. And so we were just working out of like summer programs and childcare. I could sort of leave them for a couple hours or like leave them in my house for a couple hours and not have them, you know, like a toddler having to do snacks and kind of all that stuff.

So I think that was helpful. It also was setting up expectations in our household for who was kind of doing what. It was me asking for help, which was the hardest part. And I'm still not super good at that. And I would say I didn't in the beginning, I just kept doing it [00:29:00] all. You know, kind of burning the candle at both ends there.

But I think you know, that's about the year. I think we had our kids start doing dishes like after, like doing all the dishes after dinner. Like I would come home and do all the cooking and then. They would take the, you know, take turns doing dishes with my husband or whatever. So I wasn't stuck doing that.

So I could then quick take a shower, sit on the couch and start working on my, you know, stuff and, and I would hang with them. But like I said, around 10 o'clock, my kids were sleeping. A lot of times my husband's sleeping too. And so I know a lot of people do that stuff in the morning and they talk about like, Planning your mornings.

And I don't not do that, but I'm not up at 5 AM doing that for me. It works better to do it the night before. I can get decent sleep and not have to worry when I wake up in the morning, like, blah, I got to get my whole day together. Cause I already did it, you know, the night before I have my priority sets.

I've blocked some time out. I know who I'm seeing. I'm not at the last minute gathering stuff. For a meeting I have with somebody cause I've already done it. So it really is just kind of that [00:30:00] planning ahead piece. And I think also it was letting some stuff go. My house is not as clean as it was.

You know, asking for help with landscaping, asking for help with we live in the woods, we have trees falling all over the week, especially of trees falling over the last few months with all storms. But it's like maybe not trying to do everything myself and trying to do you know, ask for help for some of that stuff.

I think that was hard at that time, too, because I didn't feel like financially I had a lot of money to ask for help to pay people to do other things either. And so right now I kind of. My schedule actually just recently changed a handful of months ago, but it's important to stay flexible when you feel like you're in a rut or something's not happening.

So I'll tell you just recently, so I've always worked till like, like nine to seven or so has been like my schedule, like Monday through Thursday. I'll end a little bit earlier on Fridays. I definitely still work on the weekends. In the beginning, I was seeing clients on the weekend, Saturdays and Sundays, because you just do what you need to do.

Now I don't do that anymore. I will meet with people like my business meetings tend to be on Saturdays. Sometimes my [00:31:00] presentations at basics aren't Saturdays. So setting some boundaries there. But what I used to do is see clients till seven ish. And then I would go to the gym after cause a, I do better at night.

You will never see me in the morning. I have super low blood pressure. You will not see me working out real lifting weights at eight in the morning. It just doesn't sit well with my body. I've tried it. It's awful. And so I w I've been doing that for 20 some years, actually, even when I was at all assess, I would lift like later and then go home and eat later.

We weren't, you know, we're eating at like eight or nine o'clock. That's the other thing. My kids are older, but it's not a big deal. And we just, that might not be most people's schedules, but it mostly works for us and I'm up later and so eight or nine o'clock is not necessarily that big of a deal. You know, my kids are up later now when they were younger, we weren't doing that.

I was eating at like 6 30 or whatever I would get done at six, but and so it's being fluid and flexible, I think a little bit, but this past winter, kind of all of a sudden I become every winter this year or every winter we have, I'm become less tolerant to [00:32:00] the cold and the dark. And so. In Wisconsin, you know, that can be tough.

And so I just all of a sudden was having a hard time leaving the office and getting to the gym at seven or seven 30. It was cold and dark and put my boots on. There's snow everywhere. I didn't want to go anyways. I don't actually ever want to go, to be honest with you. And I had to make a shift in my schedule and.

As a woman, I hated like working out in the middle of the day. The thought of that was like, you can get sweaty and then I have to change. Like my husband could go do that and like take a two minute shower, get his hair wet and do all that. And like guys can do that. And I'm like, Oh, that's such a pain. I got to take off all my dress clothes.

And I got, so in the middle of this past winter, I'm like, I need to do something different. I need to work out when it's light out. I don't think it matters what time, but it's gotta be before five. Well, how am I going to do that? Mornings are out. I do Pilates and yoga in the morning, or I will take a walk, but I lift weight seven days a week at the athletic club.

And I bet that I couldn't do in the morning. I did not have the energy. I usually fast in the morning. Cause I don't feel great eating right away. I don't feel [00:33:00] great working out fasted. So it was like, well, what am I going to do? The middle of the day just seems like an awful idea. So what I started doing is since some people aren't local that I meet with and a lot, I have business meetings and other things that aren't client related.

Is I now structure my work schedule about nine to eight. As far as like in person things. So I, you know, get up and definitely work before nine. And I, I would say I'm sitting on the couch doing a little bit, probably at 10 or 11 o'clock at night still. But I structured my sort of in person things to be 9 PM to 8 PM.

No later, no earlier. And then what I started doing was doing zoom or working at the doctor's office one morning week. Like Doing that earlier in the day from like nine to 12, nine to one, it varies. And then I put a two hour block in every day. About the same time, not exactly. Work out, run errands get my haircut, you know, do the things.

And then I go back for what I call kind of my second shift at like maybe two. And I see people then definitely like, [00:34:00] that's my busiest time. In person on the hour from two to eight then, but then at eight, when I'm done with my last person, or I try to end at seven 30. I kind of just pack up and come home and I don't have to talk myself into squatting 150 pounds because I don't want to.

So. I love how honest you are about all of the stuff too, like. Just the way that you, one of the things I like is that I have followed people or nutrition people before and it's like, batch cook all this stuff, do all this stuff, like, and they just make it look like, Oh, this is just going to be, it's going to be so easy.

And you're like, no, like, it's going to be a little bit of work. Like you're going to have to set aside time to do this stuff. I, you know, like, I don't want to go work out at night. So then I shifted my schedule and I did it like, I like the realism that you bring to it. So it's like, yes. It is work. Yeah, I understand.

And also, this is a priority for you. Like you are going to have to set aside some focus time and you're going to have to do this. But being [00:35:00] upfront about that, because I think some of it is like, Oh, well, we'll do these things. You'll, you'll like adjust your stuff. It'll be fine. We'll give you these supplements and like, Sure, but that's not going to, like, help me in the long run.

And you know, newsflash, I don't want to work out at 1 p. m. either. I don't want to at all. You know, like, I think people see me there every day and they're like, Oh, it must be nice to be in shape and work out every day. And you must love it here. I'm like, I love the club, but no, I don't want to. Sometimes it takes me 20 minutes to talk myself into going in the car.

So that's real for you though. Like I have a lot of my clients too. Cause I usually set up like batch cooking on Sundays. I try to keep my ingredients six or less, try to keep it simple. But as some people that are like I just, I just like to relax on Sundays and I'm like, so do I but I also like to have all my meals ready for me because I have a busy week.

And so you get to choose your heart kind of like, what do you want to do? And in reality, it should only take you a couple hours on a Sunday. The way that [00:36:00] I do it is. I make brunch for my family every Sunday, like late morning. And then I just stay in my, you know, stay in the kitchen in my pajamas, by the way, and just get it all done by one or two.

And then, you know, it doesn't take your whole day. I do not shop and cook on the same days either. It exhausts me. So I primarily shop at basics. And so I kind of have this Saturday structure. That's blocked out that I, people stay away from, or I kind of block out from like nine to two or nine to three, that's when I'm connecting with people, maybe in the community, hitting the farmer's market.

I go to yoga, I go to the gym, I get all our groceries. And you know, then I come home and relax and whatever, but I get all my groceries and lay it out, or maybe defrost some things. And then Sunday I'm kind of like ready to roll, but it is just time blocking a little bit and then holding yourself accountable to that you can block off stuff if you don't do it, but it's getting to the why of, and some people aren't ready to make a change.

Some people aren't ready to do [00:37:00] the work. I would argue in some ways, like sometimes people are doing the wrong work or. They're working just as hard, but it's maybe not as efficient too. And so efficiency is huge. I think when you're a busy parent and I've had many clients though, tell me. I had one just yesterday.

She said, this isn't really that bad. And I said, well, what did you think was going to be bad about it? Because she had been on all these diets and she said, well, I thought I would be starving and I had planned on having a headache and I knew I wouldn't have a lot of energy and I kind of just got ready for this to be hell and I'm like, well, I mean, depending on how you were eating before, there's a little bit of a detox period, but.

She said the biggest thing she said was I'm not suffering. And I thought, okay, that's good. But I think we have this expectation maybe that we're going to suffer when we make a life change. And so I also think that I have people feeling better fairly quickly, and that's pretty motivating to keep doing what you're doing.

You know to do that and so it's the little things [00:38:00] that you do every day Not the big stuff once in a while that you do. It's not the pizza you have once a month It's not the you know, unless you're celiac that could you know potentially kill you But like it's not the big stuff you're doing once in a while.

That isn't great It's the little things that you're doing every day. It's it's it's those uncomfortable things that you're doing every day I do everything every day. I do things. I don't want to do. They're not painful, but they're uncomfortable You They're taking supplements and vitamins. I don't want to.

I just finished treating actually a whole nother gut infection that I had where I had to take like 35 pills a day. It was awful. And I was like gagging going to take them. And I so I ended up cutting back some of my other supplements because I thought this is, you know, unrealistic, but So now I have a little bit of like, I'm just coming off of it.

I'm having a little bit of like pill trauma actually. And so I talk with people with chronic illness, women, post breast cancer that have this, the pill trauma thing. So then we try to work on liquids and some other ways to get supplements in. But so I'm doing uncomfortable things [00:39:00] every day. One time I posted that on my Facebook page, like here's all the things I did today that I didn't want to.

None of them were painful, but they're like, just, I don't want to. And But like, you're not going to be able to make a lot of great changes if you're just doing what you want all day, really. And so maybe that's drinking more water for me. Maybe that's only drinking one cup of coffee and not going to two.

Maybe that's taking supplements. Maybe that's, I sip on like a ginger lemon water in the morning before I let myself have anything else, because I know that'll reset my gut. Maybe it's not you know, people work in group environments where there's like chocolate peanut butter crap everywhere or they're, you know, everybody's bringing like sweet stuff to work.

It's saying no to that, even though you want it. But being in an emotional spot to know that you're not depriving yourself, you're just, that's not good for your body. It's getting to bed on time. That was huge for me. I sleep, like I said, pretty decent. Now I sleep 12 to like seven 30, I would say four or five nights, four or five mornings a week, and then on the weekends I try to sleep until like eight ish, but I'm getting close to eight hours of sleep.

Like [00:40:00] most nights, unless the cats are running around in my face or we have a thunderstorm, which is most of those things have happened in the last six months for sure. But I have a decent amount of energy at night. And so that's when I'm wanting to like repaint my kitchen and do stuff like that. So I have to.

Just stop and say, no, you're going to regret this in the morning cause you can't sleep in. So you gotta get up and do it all over again. It's even just getting myself to get out and take a walk. I. I don't want to all the time, you know yeah, it's lifting weights. It's lifting weights heavier than what I want to, because it's easier not to all those things.

I think it's also just again, progress over perfection. I had been ill with treating this gut infection. It's called H. Pylori. Probably people are probably familiar with it. I have all the things I've had. I never somehow had that. I've, I've helped a lot of clients with it. So I had actually done my own stool test and found it and kind of cried on the couch like, oh, cause I know what the treatment's like.

I had to put life on hold for like 12 days. Couldn't see clients. Like it was rough treating it. I don't do antibiotics very often and those were not friendly [00:41:00] to me, but one of the things I thought, oh my gosh, I can't not work out for two weeks. What am I going to do? So I missed some days for sure.

And the days that I thought I could. I did. And I went in there and I just picked something to do for 30 minutes. A couple of times I just walked a couple of times. I lifted weights. I even had a guy come up to me. I was telling my husband this the other day, cause it was, it wasn't like irritating for me.

And I don't think he made it in a bad way, but it hit me funny. He said what's going on with you? You usually lift like heavier weights. Like you're moving slow. And I'm like, I feel awful. Like, I feel awful. First I had to tell him I didn't have something that was contagious because he like backed off.

Like, Oh, you probably, you know, like you have the flu or. No, I'm just treating this gut infection and I feel awful on the antibiotics. I can't taste anything. I lost like 10 pounds. Like I felt awful, but making the decision to just go do something and balance that with also days of rest was, you know, was smart.

And so we tend to get into this all or nothing mentality. That is probably the biggest roadblock I [00:42:00] see to people's success. is I call it the Oreo mentality where you eat clean, whatever that means all week. And then you come home on a Friday and your kid brings home Oreos or something and you have three and then you get mad and you self sabotage and you say, well, where goes my whole diet?

Even though you just had three Oreos. There goes my whole diet. So I might as well have cake and wine and let's go out to eat and do a taco buffet and well now it's Friday. So screw the weekend. I might as well just do whatever over the weekend. I'll just start Monday. It's funny over the last couple of years I've been throwing around book titles and one of the titles I wanted to do, and I'm not going to, but one of the titles I wanted to do was just, I wanted to write a book called Wednesday because no one starts habits on Wednesdays.

It seems like it's always Tuesday. Mondays, it's always the first of the year. It's the first of the month. It's after my kids starts school. It's it's, it's later. It's always later. It's never now. And so I always thought there'd be a good book title start on Wednesday, but that is, [00:43:00] that's what I, people see people getting into.

When I talk with people at alcohol and like doing a 30 day detox, they're like, well, I'm just. It's either kind of they have 20 glasses of wine a week or none. There doesn't seem to be that in between of like, maybe let's just pick a day and that's the day you have your wine and the rest of the days you don't like it's it's hard for us.

I think in our culture to moderation moderation is tough that sort of 80 20 principle is tough for people. Sarah, I just want to thank you so much. I love talking to you. I love the passion that you have behind what you do. I love the perspective that you have. I felt called out a few times while you're talking.

It's probably good. But if people want to, cause I know you do work with people locally, but if there are other people that want to get involved, you do work with people virtually, you also have a lot of resources that on their own as well. Do you want to just share a little bit more information about if people want to get more information about you, about your work, they want to get started or they want to just kind of look into it.

What's the best ways for them to be able to do that? First of all, I speak free in the community, at [00:44:00] least monthly, like basics and some other locations. It's always on my website or my Facebook page. I have a really active Facebook page and website. I'm on Instagram, be honest, like a little bit, but like not much as a business.

Most of my people in my age group are responding on social media and sort of Facebook. And, and most, I don't really actively market a ton honestly, because most of my referrals are, are word of mouth, but. On my website on the landing page, if you drop your email, you'll get I think it's a one or a two week free meal plan ready to go.

So you can get a sample of what that looks like. I have years of blogs published on my website under blogs. And so I try to keep those to one or two pagers with, with resources there. I have under my shop link, you can purchase. You know, I have lots of things like under 100 that you can buy too.

That'll be good. So I have six week meal plans ready to go with grocery lists, all different types. I have whole food meal plans, pescatarian autoimmune compliant You know, diets for IBS and kind of GI stuff. And so [00:45:00] lots of different options there. I have videos on how to balance your macronutrient nutrients.

I have I have a 15 training on what are, what is stool testing? Like what the heck is that? And what I need that, or what would I do with that? And so lots of, you know, lots of options that way people can send me. Messages on Facebook messenger, you can text me anytime you can email all that stuff right on my website and public.

So that's a good place to, you know, kind of get in touch. And you have an app that's coming out. It may or may not be ready by the time that this comes out. It might be a little early, but I'll be quick about it though. Cause it's pretty exciting. This has been, when you talk about things not going smoothly, this is a really good example for me.

I've been working on an app for two years. I hired a company cause I'm not a coder to build a a nutrition, an automated meal planner app. Because that is something I've always wanted for my clients. long term after they're done working with me to kind of maintain results. Or if people choose not to work with me, what's a tool that I could give people in the community you know, that they could [00:46:00] do on their phones waiting for a dentist appointment, you know, with their six year old or sitting in the drive up lane, picking up their kid or like something that you can do just sort of on the fly.

That you could do in minutes. So I hired a company about two years ago and it actually kind of all just flopped. They weren't able to deliver what I needed. I probably hung on to them kind of too long. And so recently just hired another company very recently, like two months ago. And so I'm working on a white label app.

It'll be in the Apple store, catalyst wellness coaching. It'll be an automated meal planner app where. You can say, here's my macro nutrients, my calories that I want to eat. And if you don't know, it'll calculate for you. Here's the foods that I'm allergic to. Here's the foods that after I eat, I don't feel good.

Here's the foods I don't like. Here's how many meals a day I want. Here's how many snacks I do. And then it'll spit out recipes, simple whole food recipes that have all been dietitian tested and rated and flagged that you can basically like click and Into a [00:47:00] seven day a week meal, you know, you can do breakfast.

You can do, you can do leftovers. You can do snacks and then it'll put together a grocery list for you. I'm working on 20 in 2025, booking that with Instacart. I don't use Instacart, but some of my clients do like pickups. And won't be desktop friendly. The original one I had wasn't, but you could use it on like a tablet or like an iPad and you could I'm trying to make it printable.

You could screenshot it, but it's real. It's like a digital. Version. I get people that talk about just being in ruts with what to eat and how much to eat and what to eat. And so if you have already worked with me, you'll have all that put together. And then people just get in a rut of eating the same thing all the time and they want some variety.

You can, one of the takes is eight ingredients or less. And so you could like put that. And so I think long term, so that will roll out ballpark as we're doing this, like October 1st, I'm doing a soft roll out of that. And then in 2025, you can look for me to be speaking on that sort of live and, and like video trainings on how to use it.

And [00:48:00] so it'll be minimal cost a month and something that, you know, less than a gym membership, just something that you can use to be able to get by honestly, and, and plan it'll make it easier to plan ahead. So you don't have to be like, what should I make? Again, this week, I don't know what to make, you know, it'll give you the ideas.

Sounds like the dream to me. Meal planning is the absolute nemesis. I hate it. I can't. We have too many different things. It sounds amazing. So I am so excited for that to come out. I can't wait to check that out. Well, Sarah, thank you so much for coming. Thank you for sharing with our audience. I love speaking with you.

I love just the, the way that you are, just have such a unique perspective on it. I just appreciate that. So thank you for coming. Thank you everyone for listening and we'll see you next time on another episode.​

Kimberlyn: Thanks for hanging out with us today. Parenting and productivity are challenging, but you don't have to go it alone. If you're looking for more support, we'd love for you to join the Village, our online community, and co-work space. Check out the link in the show notes for more information and to see if the village would [00:49:00] be a good fit for you.

Can't wait to see you on the inside. Bye.