What’s up guys, and welcome back to another great episode of the fit to fat to fit experience podcast. I’m your host drew Manning. I’ll be flying solo today. Uh, Lynn is out and won’t be able to make it, but today we have a great episode with Fallon Mercedes. She is the third female trainer to be on fit fat to fit the TV show on A&E. And today we’re going to sit down with her. If you haven’t watched her episode yet on a knee, I definitely recommend you watch the episode first before you go any further. So if you haven’t watched that push pause, I don’t want to, you know, ruin any surprises for you after watching the episode. So go watch the episode, then come listen to this. For those that have listened or seen the show her show. Um, then what we’re going to talk about obviously today is, you know, Fallon’s journey from fit, tread fit and obviously the, the pink elephant in the room.
What happened with D? Why did he quit? You know, we’ve never seen this happened during the season. This is the first time they were doing so good and then all of a sudden he just was a mess and just decided to quit. And it seemed like he hated Fallon. Um, and there was a very, very uncomfortable scene, you know, where we kind of dive into what happened, um, between them and uh, you know, it seems like Fallon did everything she could and we talked about does she have any regrets? Is there something she would have gone back and changed and she admits that maybe there’s something she could have done. But ultimately it came down to JD and his decision to leave and quit, which is unfortunate, you know, cause you hate to see people that you care about not take their health very seriously. But at the same time, I think people are really going to be able to relate to J D and understand, look, sometimes we sacrifice our health for wealth, you know, and for jobs we sacrifice a lot and we make that our top priority.
Paying the bills. We’re ambitious, but at what price does that come? So we dive into that with Fallon. We talk about her specifics of her training and nutrition and her philosophies and you guys get to know her so much more personally versus what you see on the episodes. Cause in the episodes you guys, I know that there these people are painted a picture a certain way and sometimes you might not like the person that was painted on on camera but listen to the podcast, you really get to know their personality a lot more and see them for who they really are even though it’s reality TV guy. So you’ll definitely want to stick around for this episode. And uh, we, we definitely cover a lot of gyms, uh, hidden gyms in this episode. But first our show sponsored you guys as always is dollar workout club.com dollar workout club.com for those of you who don’t know is an online program that was created by me, Lynn and Natalie Hodson and it’s an online platform that you subscribe to.
It’s only a dollar a week, you guys, it’s a buck a week. There’s no contracts, no hidden fees. And basically what you get for that dollar is so much high quality content that it blows the competition out of the water. You get five and you get access to five at home workout videos that be done in all fitness levels and all workout videos. You guys are done at home with very minimal equipment. You don’t need special equipment to, to follow these workouts. If you’re a beginner and you haven’t worked out in years or if you’re advanced like me for example, you know, uh, you can get a great workout in, in 10 to 20 minutes. And then on top of that, your dollar goes even further by giving you access to five, uh, healthy recipe videos that are created by us. And you also get access to five motivational videos that are created by AZ, um, that, uh, cover things like, uh, you know, tips and tricks to help you maintain, live and maintain a healthy lifestyle. So check it out. Dollar workout, club.com. Like I said, it’s just a book a week. There’s no longterm commitments. It’s really very high quality content for what you get for just a buck. Whereas you’re going to pay anywhere between 12 to $15 a for our competitors’ websites, uh, beach body or you know, daily burn, which are great by the way. I have nothing against those, but you get so much more@dollarworkoutclub.com so I definitely would recommend you checking it out. Um, and let just know what you guys think. Okay. Let’s dive into today’s episode with Fallon.
Fallon. Thank you so much for joining me here on the fit to fat to fit experience podcast. How are you doing today?
I am so excited to finally be on the podcast. I have been waiting for my episode to air. I’ve been listening to everybody else’s episodes and podcasts, so I’m like excited. Finally, it’s my turn all that hard work for one episode.
I know it is your turn all this time, all this filming and everything and you know, one 45 minute episode on TV, one 45 minute podcasts with me. It’s crazy. All that work for just a little bit of air time, right?
Yeah. But it’s, it’s well worth it. I’m excited, you know, to see how everybody reacts and hopefully, you know, they can sympathize with my client and me at the same time.
Yes. So let’s just dive into your episode cause your episode was full of drama was, you know, the first time we’ve had anybody quit, you know, for the most part on the show. Um, and it was a huge surprise. It was a huge shock. I think a lot of people’s hearts were broken. The CJ D kind of bow and just, um, you know, kind of give up on himself, which is very, very unfortunate. But here’s the thing is I think a lot of people can relate to that cause they’ve seen people in their lives that have given up on themselves, you know, physically, emotionally, and it’s not just physically, right? I mean it’s, it has to do with a lot more emotional problems. But let’s start, let’s back up before that. Let’s start with your awakening journey. Okay. So here you are. You hear about this TV show, you try out for it. You live out in LA, you know, you’re very good looking woman. And at what point did you find out that you had to gain this weight for the show?
I remember I was in, um, the casting office and I had, you know, they were telling me about it, but they didn’t reveal to me that I had a gain weight. But then when they told me, and they told me that it was the book that you wrote based off of, you know, your book, I was like, Oh, okay. I actually read your book. So I was like, Oh, I get it. But I also was like, Oh dang, I wanted to do a bikini competition. I’m like, Oh, I don’t know about this. So I had, um, I had spoke to my boyfriend about it and he was the one who really convinced me. He was like, you know, actresses put on weight and lose it for a role. He was like, why not do it? And then like my background, I went to school for broadcast journalism, so I have a report or background. So kind of the reporter in me was like, you know what do it, you know, you seem to claim, you know, you’re great at what you do, we’ll prove it. So it was kind of exciting in a weird way to gain the weight and then try to lose it.
So you pretty much took it on as a challenge. Like this is the challenge that I’m going to show. You know what I what I’m made of. Is that what you’re saying? Okay. Now here’s, there’s another funny question is you, you have or why didn’t you still do the bikini competition? That would’ve been funny. Just step on stage. All confident, you know, a little bit curvier. You still could have won.
I think the dual bikini competition, you have to have your body fat percentage at a certain percentage. And I think when I gained the most of my weight, the majority of my weight, I think I was like 40 plus percent. So I think they would have not allowed me to even step on stage, but I would have, if they would’ve let me,
that would’ve been really funny. I would’ve been a funny part of the show if that would’ve happened. Yeah.
I mean the, basically the, the show aired me and like a sports bra and little shorts. So I mean that’s even bigger than a bikini competition. The whole world is gonna see me with my fat out.
Yeah. Oh so, um, so here, here we are. You’re, so there’s three females on the show, three female trainers and yours is the third episode to air. You gained the most weight out of all the female trainers. Um, and here’s what, one thing that people don’t realize is they didn’t really see a lot of the behind the scenes stuff as far as you struggling to put on the weight. Can you go into a little bit more detail, cause the episode didn’t show everything, some of the other emotional struggles that you had going on in your life that had to do with this weight gain process. Cause I Skyped with you once a month to kind of check in on you and you know, see how you were doing and there was, you know, it, they made it look like it was pretty easy, you know, for you to put it on. But really, I mean, how, how hard did you struggle?
You know, I’ll never forget, um, the executive producer, Dan, who you interviewed for the show, uh, he brought me to and it brought me into his office. I think the first month after the first month of waking sat me down and said, you are the outlier. You are the only trainer who is not packing on the weight consistently. We are not sure if we believe you that you’re really trying to gain the weight. Then the door opened and he had the biggest ice cream sundae waiting for me. And literally I had to eat the Sunday in front of him to prove to him, I am really trying to gain the weight. So it’s just so funny that I was the one who was like, they didn’t believe that I was trying to gain the weight. They thought I was scared and yet I gained the most weight at the end out of all the girls. So
here’s the funny thing is I know Dan and I know exactly why he did that and he’s very, very smart at doing that. Um, because he, because here’s the thing, and you know, he might hate me for saying this, but he told other trainers that too because here’s the thing is he, I I knew from Skyping with you guys once a month that I could see you guys were trying, but a lot of you guys were like hitting plateaus as far as the weight gain goes. And of course for ratings, this is a reality TV show people, we do want you to put it on as much weight as possible in the four months. Cause a lot of people complained. Well it’s not even noticeable. They gained 20 pounds. And so anyways, you are trying to gain as much weight as possible. But you know, I, I could tell that some people were kind of scared.
Like, I don’t want to get too big cause you know, I don’t want to get stretch marks or I don’t want to be able to get so big. I can’t, I can’t turn back. But here’s the thing, and this is the parallel to the other side of it is you as the trainer expect your client to do everything, give you 100% what you going to tell them to do to live your lifestyle and go from fat to fit. And they expect you to do the same thing for them. And so it’s easy just to kind of coast and be like, well I’m eating pizza and fries. But you know, I think that’s funny that he made you do that though in front of him.
And you know, I, I knew it too cause I’m like there’s no way these girls are packing on. I was eating Blackfellows rice and beans, like everything fried. I was like, there’s no way. And then two, I think a lot of people don’t realize, um, it takes a while for your metabolism to slow down, the same way it takes a while for it to speed up when you’re trying to lose the weight. So, but yeah, I guess, I guess Dan got me a little D
no, it’s smart, you know, as he’s very smart at what he does and he’s an executive producer for a reason. And so, um, but yeah, you, you did have some struggles getting the way we know that you did try hard to put on the way. You can definitely see that in the episode. Uh, but talk to us a bit more about the specifics of what things you struggled with, especially on the mental and emotional level or maybe in medical side as well that surprise you.
Yeah. Um, I think what surprised me the most out of everything, like yeah, I did get gain, um, a lot of weight and had tons of headaches and, you know, nausea. Um, but I think what surprised me the most, Oh, this surprised me. Um, I don’t know if I shared this with you before, but I typically, I am really cold at night. I have to like sleep on a heating pad cause I don’t know what it is. Like I just, I’m always cold, my feet are always cold. But when I gained the weight, I was sweating profusely at night. I was like, I felt like a heater was, it was just bizarre. I was just constantly sweating at night, so I just had so much body fat. I was like a beer. But, um, uh, other than that, what surprised me was getting my menstrual cycle every two weeks. It literally scared me to the point where I was like, I might just tap out and quit the show because, you know, right now I don’t have any children, but you know, I do want to become a mom one day and I just didn’t realize how much weight gain can affect, you know, your reproductive system as a woman.
Yeah. And that’s, that’s one thing that’s scary, you know, with this experiment. This is an experiment, you know, just so everybody knows, you are um, you know, supervised by a doctor that’s, you know, checking, doing blood work and checking up on you, but it can’t affect you at so many other levels other than just your weight gain. Right. Your hormone levels and things like that and how it affects you is directly related to your diet and uh, it’s kind of scary, right?
Yeah, totally scary. I so then it just, I think every episode, um, they don’t show the guys cry that much, which is weird. I think JJ was the only cry baby, but so far you see Carrie crying, you see Matt crying and you are going to see me crying. But what they don’t show my episode is that actually JJ cries more than me and that’s because his [inaudible] was so low, so it looks like I cried a lot, but he actually cried way more than me.
Shout out to J J J just going to get mad. But that’s kind of funny. That’s a good point. Yeah. JJ was the only one that cried out of the dues. But you know, it’s just, you know, he’s sweating from his eyeballs cause he works out so much. That’s what it is. Guys aren’t guys don’t cry. We work out. Um, but that’s actually, that’s really funny. So, okay, let’s fast forward a little bit because here’s the things you gained 41 pounds, but you’re a little, I mean I’ve seen you in person, you’re tiny, like as far as your height goes. So it is very noticeable because you’re so sure it is. It just goes out. Right. And it was remarkable to see how much weight you gained so quickly, uh, where you kind of surprised at how quickly and how much weight you gained in those four months. Did you expect to gain more or less than that?
Honestly, I didn’t believe that I would gain that much weight like I was trying to. But if you would’ve asked me the four months prior to me gaining the weight and if I was honestly speaking, I would have said, no, I’ll probably gain 25 30. I never thought that I would gain 40 plus pounds and my parents are back on the East coast and I told them like I’m gaining weight, I’m gaining weight. So after I packed on the 40 plus pounds, I sent them photos and my mom called me. She was like, honey, are you pregnant? I’m like, no mom. She’s like, are you sure? Are you, did you get pregnant during this, this period of weight gaining? I’m like, no mom, I’m just bad. Leave me alone.
That is really funny. That is actually a really fun but here’s the thing is I know you personally fell in and you know you are actually confident. You know you actually liked the way your body looked at. You mean you were a little bit curvier, you know, little bit more junk in the trunk and you were actually, you know, this isn’t that bad actually like this, you know. Whereas most people, you know, trainers that have been in shape their whole life are like kind of freaking out cause they didn’t know how to embrace their bigger body. You, on the other hand, it didn’t show a lot of that in the episode, but I know you personally, you actually liked being a little bit curvier, right?
Yeah. I mean, um, it wasn’t just a little junk in the trunk. There was a lot of junk. Um, and I didn’t like the cellulite that came with it, but I feel like, um, one thing that I tried to teach my clients, especially especially my female clients, is that like, you have to love yourself no matter what size you are. Yeah. You want to try to get to your best you, but you have to love yourself in the process. So I felt like, who would I be as a trainer? I’d be a hypocrite saying, you know, don’t love yourself at your biggest. So that was something that I really had to embrace. So, you know, if I went out at night with my girlfriends or on a date with my boyfriend, I would throw my Spanx and make those curves work. And you know, and again, I’m half Dominican, so I’m used to being curvy, even at my fittest.
You know, some people might look at and be like, Oh she’s not fit. She shouldn’t be a trainer, but I’m fit curvy, what I like to call. And I feel like I’m comfortable being curvy. And you know, I did get big and even though that’s not where I want to be, I just tried to love myself, you know, through the process. And they have that saying, you know, fake it till you make it. And I just faked my confidence until I believed it until I could look in the mirror and be like, you know what, you are beautiful inside and out.
Yeah. Because here’s the thing is I know on this show, this is a reality TV show. They try and portray people that are overweight as sad and kind of depressed. And now these trainers are so emotional cause they’re, they’re overweight. That’s not what it’s all about. There’s a lot of people that you probably know that are bigger, thicker, curvy, or whatever you want to call it that are so confident and happy and who they are. Am I right?
Yeah. So what I tell people too is that, you know, it’s not necessarily the numbers on the scale. You should be happy and shout out to, you know, all the people who are confident in their skin, whatever size they are. But what, what is most important is your body fat percentage because you know, you want to be confident, but to the, the place that I was at, I was confident, but you know, when your body fat percentage gets that high, you shouldn’t feel good. If you’re having issues with your health, your menstrual cycle, high blood pressure, pre-diabetic, that’s the issue. It’s, it’s your health, you know, not, not so much what you look like. You want to make sure that you’re living a healthy life so you can enjoy life the way it should be enjoyed.
Yeah. And that’s what I wanted to talk about next was that that’s what your real struggle was. It was like you could embrace the bigger body, the thicker curves. That’s not the part that bothers you the most. It was how you felt, right. Your hormones off and you know, the way you felt, uh, emotionally and physically from the weight gain like is okay to love your body. But yeah, when you’re talking about those health issues and that’s what we try and preach here, you know, with my brand and what, what you guys do as well, Fallon is, is getting people to focus on their medical health first and then let weight loss and those kinds of things be a byproduct of living a healthy lifestyle over time. But take care of your health first and foremost because we all know there’s a lot of unhealthy ways to lose weight.
You know, you could definitely starve yourself or you know, there’s a lot of unhealthy ways to get a six pack. So it doesn’t mean that you’re becoming healthier just by losing weight. So I love that you, you, you talked about that. Okay, let’s focus cause a big portion of this episode, Oh, focus on the struggle between you and J D now, the first little bit you guys were like best friends. I was like, this is such a perfect couple. You know, here’s Fallon, five foot, nothing, you know, and here’s a, you know, here’s J D like six, five, four 40 or something. When he first started, I’m like, this is the total opposite. And you guys made such like a perfect couple as far as like training goes. I was like, this is going to be awesome. And it looked like, you know, he liked you, you like Tim and there was a good, um, uh, comradery there between you two. At what, at what point did things start to turn South that you noticed, you know, even behind the scenes, off camera.
Yeah. Um, so yeah, I fell in love with JD once I saw his tape. Um, my mom, she has a lung disease and his mom had cancer. So I feel like once he said that he wanted to lose the weight to inspire himself, but also inspire his mom, that really hit home for me. And you know, he’s a big lovable guy. Very nice. But, um, when I noticed there was another side to him, um, and I don’t think I shared this with anybody before, but I remember, you know, we had to do our one on one interviews and my call time was set for a certain time and I guess they went over on JDS interview. So I had accidentally walked into the room on JD and I overheard him saying, you know, Fallon’s not a good trainer. She doesn’t know how to train me.
She doesn’t know what she’s doing. I keep telling her my legs hurt and she keeps on wanting to do legs and I slowly backed out and shut the door. And that’s when I kind of realized, Oh, okay. And then I confronted him on camera. I said, Hey, you know, how do you think I’m training you? Is everything okay? Is there anything else you want me to do? And he totally be like, no, no, you’re fine. You’re doing a good job. And, and that’s when I realized, okay, I got to watch out for him. There’s another side to him. So when the numbers didn’t match up on the scale for the nutrition plan that I gave him for the workouts he was supposed to be doing, I already knew, you know, he might be, he might not be telling me the whole truth. And then, you know, on social media he skipped a workout and he, he said he was and he wasn’t.
And then you know, there was a couple times I was on his social media and I saw him, I think eating like burgers or having beer. And then when I asked him, he would tell me, I swear I’m hungry. I’ve only been having protein shakes. So I mean that’s, that’s one, that’s when it kinda hit hit for me. And it was hard because like I, I didn’t want to be too hard on him because I know it’s a sensitive subject and I know just to get him to work out was already a big deal. But I didn’t want to be that drill Sergeant trainer and scare him away. But as you could see in the end, he chose not to train with me anyway. So a part of me feels like, okay, was it in vain? You know, all my effort.
Yeah. Wow, that’s really interesting. I know, I didn’t know about that part of you walking in on him and overhearing him and then you confronting him and then note and you didn’t call him out on it. I thought that was really interesting to kind of see how that played out. But I think as, as a trainer, you know, I don’t train a lot anymore these days, but as most trainers I’ve probably experienced that with their clients where their client is like, I’m doing everything you’re telling me, you know, protein shakes and salads, that’s all I’m eating. You know that there’s something else going on. But here’s the thing is you can react one of two ways. Be like either tell me the truth and because you’re lying to me right now. Or you can be like, you know what I believe you, like it’s okay, we’ll keep working at it.
There’s like those two routes you can take. And it just depends on the person, like the person has to. And at the end of the episode, JD even says it, there’s no one else that can motivate me but me, I have to be my own motivation. And that’s what it came down to is like you, you could do both of those routes. You could be the militant person, or you could be the merciful, you know, empathetic trainer that is listening to him and understanding him. But at the same time, he, it comes down to a choice and he just wasn’t ready and decided not to follow through. And, you know, unfortunately just made excuses and, um, it is what it is, you know? That’s, that’s unfortunate. And it happened on camera for him. And I think I feel bad for him. You who knew him definitely feel bad for him because he chose not to follow through. And I think it’s going to break, you know, people that haven’t seen it, it’s gonna break a lot of people’s hearts. Yeah. So, um, and here’s the other thing, another powerful moment on the show was you guys walk into the doctor’s office and talking to him about his blood work. Can you kind of run through that and uh, kinda recap that scene for us?
Yeah. I had just gotten to the point with him where I didn’t know what else I could do with him. You know, that I Skyped with you and you like coached me through that. I need to talk to him. I had multiple come to Jesus meetings with him. I gave him plenty of opportunities for him to tell me the truth that he’s been cheating on his nutrition plan and he still wouldn’t man up and tell me. So the only other card that I had in my pockets, a pool was okay. You said you’re pretty healthy for a big guy. Let’s see what the blood says. So I took him to go get his blood labs red. And you know, for me it was emotional for so many reasons. One, because I put my, my health at stake for him too. I wanted it so bad for him.
I wanted to show him he can live an amazing healthy life. He didn’t have to live like this anymore. And three, um, my father had a stroke a little over a year and a half ago. Um, and you know, it was, it was very hard to watch him. It took months and months to rehab to get mobility back. And it all stems from him not taking care of him, care of his diabetes due to his diet. So when the dietician read the results, it just, I, I couldn’t hold it in anymore. I just really, it literally just came out. I was trying to be strong and I just started crying and I really just put my heart on my sleeve and I wanted to say, listen, JD, like this is a wake up call for your life. And you know, I th I thought I was almost a hundred percent sure that that would have gotten through to him. Yeah.
And it obviously didn’t, cause that’s the thing is he didn’t get emotional at all. But I think a lot of people are gonna be able to relate to that Fallon because there’s a lot of people who might be overweight, maybe not as big as you Eddie, but they’re like, you know what? I feel fine. I feel healthy. I don’t feel like I’m dying. And that was very similar to my experience doing fit to fat to fit. When I went on the dr Oz show, at my heaviest, I was like, look, I know I’m overweight but I don’t feel like my liver, my kidneys hurt. Like I don’t feel like I was in that but a shape. But based on my numbers, it was a wake up call for me when dr Oz showed me, okay, here’s a healthy liver and here’s your liver, here’s a healthy kidney and here’s your kidney.
Based on what you’re doing to your body, eating these foods that you know, a large percentage of Americans eat those foods and think, you know, I’m doing okay. Like I’m not that bad. I can walk, I can get around, I can get up and down off the couch and you know, wa a walk with my kids. But things like that you would think would be a wakeup call for people that JD, but at the end of the day, you know, to each their own, some people just won’t be motivated. Even if you show them like, look, you’re going to be dead in two years. The big, all right, well you know, so man, that, that part was very, very deflating for me. I think a lot of people’s, well like, man, JD, c’mon, you can do this. Like don’t like, please realize that you’re worth to be healthy. You’re worth it to, to live a long, healthy life.
And like he said at the end of the episode, he’s like, I want to get married, I want to have kids. And but at the same time, you know, he didn’t really, he wasn’t ready to change just yet. So I’m glad that they showed that part because I know that this show focuses a lot on weight loss and like what the scale says and like, you know, it’s a success if you lose weight and if you’re not then, then you’re not successful. But really at the end of the day, if you can just change your medical health, you’ll feel so much better. Um, the white will take care of itself over time. Um, so anyways, I’m glad that they showed that. Okay. The next thing I want to talk about Fallon, this is a very hard, uncomfortable scene to watch. Um, was, was your last straw with J D where you kind of gave him the ultimatum of, of, look, you know, I’ll do whatever it takes to help you, but if you don’t meet me here at this park at this time, like then it’s over. And he just kinda like lashed out at you. Was that as uncomfortable for you as it was for us watching?
Honestly, you know, I felt so disrespected and I was already at my wit and you know, I know hurt people, hurt people and I tried to not take it so personal and I really, I just had to lay down the law. This is what it is. You know, I let him, you know, throughout the course that we trained to come together, I let him dictate a lot of things and you know, he would say, okay, I can’t make it. Or you know, I knew he wasn’t following the nutrition plan and I felt like to my owl I felt like I was coddling him a little and because I didn’t want to scare him off, but to me I felt like I’m doing him no justice if I’m letting him get away with certain things and certain behaviors. So I, and in real life, my normal clients, I would never let them get away with something like that.
So I just had to lay down the law. This is what it is and you can curse at me. You can lash out at me like I get it. But at the end of the day, this is what it is. I’m the trainer and you know, this might not have been it, but a part of me felt like would he have had acted that way if I was a male trainer, you know, a little, a little part of me felt like maybe he didn’t respect me as much because he didn’t care as much or was it a part of it because I was a female? I don’t know. There was just so many emotions, but I just in that moment to kind of step back and say, this is what it is, either you’re 100% in or you’re not. Because I was going above and beyond for him. I was constantly, you know, driving to him, training to him, calling him, you know, tweaking his nutrition, trying to help him, you know, checking up on him and I didn’t see the same, um, the same, you know, effort being given back to me.
Looking back at it now, do you think there’s something you could have done differently? Like do you kind of feel guilty or blame herself? Like if I would have maybe done this or been more empathetic or you know, if something else do you, do you look back and feel any kind of guilt about it at all or feel like there’s something else you could’ve done?
No, I think it took me a while to, cause it’s been a couple of months since the show, but it took me a while to, to not blame myself and I, I finally had to realize like your not the problem. He’s been living like this for a long time and if he doesn’t truly want it, there’s nothing that I could say or do. I mean I even had his blood labs read. Like what else could I possibly do to motivate him? I think if there was one thing that I could have changed, maybe it was, it was to have been harder on him from the beginning, but I feel like that would have scared him off in the beginning. So, you know, I’m happy he was able to lose some weight with me and I hope, you know, even though he gained some of the weight back, I hope, you know, one day he’ll be ready and he’ll lose all the way and contact me and say, Hey, I did it and I will be super happy and proud of them if he does do that.
So it’s been about five months since the end of filming. Four or five months or six months maybe now for you. Um, have you had any contact with him since then?
No. No contact,
no contact. Not on social media or nothing? Nothing. Okay. Just curious. I’m assuming a lot of people want to know like, Oh, maybe you guys are friends now or
I um, but for I left and they didn’t show this. I gave him a hug that kind of looks like I just walked away. Um, but I hugged him and I said, you know, the decision is yours. I’m here for you if you need me. And he never contacted me again. And I feel like if I was to reach out to him, that’s me doing the work again. You know, if he would have contacted me even a week later and said, you know what, I’m game, I’m ready. I would have been like, okay, let’s go. But he never, he never contacted me again.
And this is really interesting because here’s the thing, the whole fit to fat to fit movement that we’re doing and with you guys, you know, doing this fit to fat to fit journey and me doing my fit fat to fit journey and having other people do this experience is to hopefully have these trainers gained some more empathy. And then the overweight clients being more motivated to trust their trainer knowing that they’re on their side and they’re kind of understanding where they’re coming from. Not that they’ll fully understand, but the hope is that, you know, the clients will be able to trust the trainers more out there that are trying to push them. But at the end of the day, even this, doing this fit, fit the fit journey doesn’t guarantee that, you know, all clients will be motivated. To now trust their trainers. I think a lot of people are super inspired by the fit threat to fit movement of trainers, trying to gain weight to, to try and empathize and gain a better understanding.
But it doesn’t always work out perfectly. And this is one example, you know, a nine out of 10 episodes, you know, well I shouldn’t give away the other, the other Indies to the other uh, two episodes after you. But um, you know, it’s not guaranteed all the time, but that’s what my hope is with the fit to fat to fit movement is have these trainers or the clients kind of, uh, be able to trust their trainers more and have the trainers have a better understanding. Um, getting back to you Fallon, um, can you talk to us about what your nutrition plan was specifically? Cause someone and people always want to know like, okay, did you just have protein shakes and salad? Like J D was saying like that’s all I eat for seven days. It’s like, what was your nutrition strategy going into this? And you said you worked out, you know, two to three hours a day. Is that sustainable or what or where are you at now?
Do you want my nutrition plan for the show or for now? Like,
yeah, let’s do maybe the for the show. Cause here’s the thing. You did try and lose the weight in four months. So I understand a little bit more extreme probably.
So I’m for the show, my nutrition plan was basically, you know, living in the carbs. I know a lot of people, um, are like, you know, doing macros or they, for me personally, my body, it just, everybody’s different. But my body loves carbs. So I limited the carbs and I, you know, I had a cap on my calories for the day. I did 1200 calories or less a day. I’m not giving that for everybody to do, but that worked well for my body. And what I do suggest for everybody to do, if you are serious and you want to lose some weight, do a food journal, you really, once you, there’s something powerful when you write it down. Um, even to this day, I still do it. Food journal, all my clients, I make them do a food journal, even log, you know, your workouts, how much you’re burning.
Add that to the food journal because it makes a difference. One pound of fat is 3,500 calories. So you should be knowing how much you’re consuming and how much you’re burning. Some people, they get to the point where they don’t need to do that. For me, I like seeing what I eat. I love chocolate, so I don’t want to write that chocolate down in my food journal. So I’ll make it a point, you know, uh, today I’m going to have a clean slate. I’m not gonna write that down. And then, you know, give yourself a cheat meal a week or, and I think portion control is huge. Um, you know, if you’re going to eat something that you know, might not be the healthiest, make sure you’re not going to supersize it. You know, do, get it out of the way if you want to have that burger or whatever it is. But do you know maybe one button instead of two of the buns and the burger and do the small size, don’t do the fries, you know, instead of the soda do water so that he really takes away, you know, from, from the whole meal that you’re eating. So you’re not going to be packing on the pounds. You’ll still be on target for whatever your weight loss is.
Yeah. And so, and so now that you’re maintaining though your weight for the most part, what does your nutrition look like? Pretty much the same or what’s the difference between those?
Um, yeah, it’s kind of the same. Um, what I do is, and I tell everybody I have to eat breakfast. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. It’s called breakfast for a reason. You’re breaking the fast. Um, so I wake up, I work out, eat breakfast, a good big one. I love, um, crustless key. She can go to my blog, fit with fallon.com to get the recipe. Um, I love what else? I love salmon. I make this really amazing like salty, sweet salmon, but not too, too much soda. Sodium. Um, I like sweet potatoes, kale salads. I love protein shakes, grapefruit, all that stuff. So, um, yeah, I, I have a very, uh, variety of food that I like to eat, but I just make sure I do the portions.
And what about your exercise during the four months versus now? Do you work out three to four times a day or how often were you working out during the show and what kind of exercise were you doing and then transition to where you are now? Like what you do for exercise?
Um, for now for exercise, I’m just doing a lot of hit high intensity interval intervals, plyometrics. And then I like to do fun workouts like hiking and stuff like that. And during the show, um, I did the same thing during the show. I would on the weekends try to get outside or do something active and fun. But during the week I was in the gym hitting it hard. I’m doing at least 45 minutes of cardio and then strength training for a good half an hour.
Okay. Wow. So man. So do you feel like you’re in, do you feel like you’re in better shape now versus when you, before you started this fit to fat to fit journey?
Yes, I definitely feel stronger. I feel like, um, because I, I was more focused and dedicated before I was kinda, I didn’t have a set game plan. Now I F I feel like I had to prove to myself that I could not only be fit but be fitter than what I was.
And how are you different now as a trainer versus before, during the journey or how have you changed?
I think when my clients say I can’t do one more, I am like I get it, my arms put into one more either I get it now. Yeah, it’s a little bit more empathy. Yeah, definitely more empathy. Yeah. Yeah.
Which is good. And I feel like I’m the same way. Like I get a little bit more where they’re coming from cause I’ve kind of experienced that as well. And it does change your perception of how you train people because you’re finally understanding, okay, I know how hard it is. Versus like when you’ve been in shape your whole life, you’re like, okay, I get it. It’s hard, but you don’t really get it. You don’t really understand just how hard it is because you’ve never experienced it. So you can’t really process that in your brain to be like, well, just push harder. You know what I’m saying? And the mind is an incredible thing. Your body is incredible, can do hard things. It can do impossible things, but to know where people are coming from, I think it just helps them know and trust you more and more motivated to push harder, which you do see in a lot of the episodes where like for example, last week carrying Kennedy, Kennedy is like, I’m going to do this last one for you. You know,
love that. Loved her. Wish she was my client, loved her
poor Fallon. I know I feel bad for you, but, um, you know, who knows, J D might be listening to this and he might be motivated to continue to make a change in his lifestyle from this experience. So I appreciate you Fallon doing this first and foremost. And, um, I hope that it has changed you for the better and it sounds like it has. And I really do hope that you have awesome clients that are just like gold and they’ll do anything you ask, you know, but it’s good.
Well, thanks for letting me do this. And I would never again do this experiment ever.
Yeah. I wasn’t gonna ask you if you wanna apply for season two, but
the only time I’ll get fat again is if I’m going to have a baby. That’s it.
Are you making it an announcement or
no, no, no. There’s no ring on my fingers.
Oh, okay. Okay. Well keep us posted on that. And, um, you know, at the end of the day, I’m sure you learn some experiences from, cause when we go through hard times in our life or trials like this, you come out learning something that’s going to help you become better in the long run, I believe. So I’m sure, I’m sure something for you is, is you’ve learned something that’s gonna help you launch later on down the road. Okay. Really quick before we, we close with the lightning round questions, um, tell people where they can find you, social media, blogs, all of that.
You can find me online@fitwithfallon.com my blog. You can find me on social media at fit with Fallon on Instagram and Twitter and yeah, reach out to me if you have any questions. I would love to respond and, and um, help you out any way I can.
Okay. Um, thanks. Okay. Really quick, last few questions for you, Fallon, just, and these are kind of funny. What was the most embarrassing moment you had during your eight months of fit to fat to fit?
Um, the most embarrassing is when I gained the weights. The producers would not let me put a shirt on and I would yell at them and say, I would never train a male client in a sports bra like my boobs. You know, they were just humongous after I gained the weight in my stomach and like, and then I had wear shorts on top of it. It was just, I was, I’m not going to lie, I was not embarrassed because of the weight so much, but I was embarrassed that I had to be in a sports bra on national television at my heaviest. Like now I know what biggest losers contestants feel like when they get on the scale with a sports bra and shorts.
Yeah. I know I had the, it’s funny that they have to do that. I didn’t know that. It makes everybody uncomfortable for
yeah. Even the people viewing.
Yeah. What was the funniest thing that happened during filming, whether you’re on camera or off camera?
Um, funniest thing. What was funny? Hmm. I don’t know
the funnest moment you had with J D what was the funnest thing?
Oh, when I wrestled him to the ground, he would Dady would act so tough and he was so huge and I’m like, I could take you and like I would literally be like wrestling with him and I would always take him down. It was, it was pretty cool.
No, I actually was really impressed by that. I’m like, Oh, I like, you know, you actually really took them down. Like he really did fall down. So good job. Okay. What’s one thing in this life that you can’t without? Besides like, you know, family or friends or you know, TV or stuff like that. Yeah. Working out. I mean, for months I was torture. No, like a physical give me like a physical product. Like something that you just like, it’s like you’re, you have my cell phone. I am addicted to social media. I know you’re, you’re, I know that that must’ve been hard not posting pictures everyday. Right. Yeah. No, I appreciate you being on social media. Cause then you’re able to, uh, live tweet with me on Tuesday nights during the show cause I’m not the only one trying to answer a million people’s questions so. Well thank you so much felon. Hey, I really do appreciate you being a part of this movement.
Okay guys, sorry that uh, we kind of a cut short I guess Fallon’s uh, phone died as she was doing the interview. Luckily we were just wrapping up anyways and I was just saying goodbye to her and just wanting to tell her that I appreciated her. So sorry about that, that it got cut short but that’s okay. I think we covered everything we needed to. Uh, hopefully you guys go check Fallon out and continue to watch the next two episodes of fit to fat to fit season one’s coming to an end you guys. But I have announced if you do want to track for season two, you can go to fat to fit casting.com. That’s fat number two, fit casting.com to try out for the show. Whether you’re a client or whether you’re a brave trainer that’s willing to do this, your body and mind.
Um, go check it out. Go apply for the show if you want. Um, please follow me on social media. You guys at fit to fat fit or all my social media handles. My website is fit for it to fit.com. I have a newsletter that will keep you in the know as far as upcoming events where my travels will be so that you can come meet me, shake hands, take a picture. Um, and definitely follow me on social media as well if you want to um, you know, seem more uh, about what I’m up to. And then Lynn’s website is to fit at home number two, fit@home.com and a hers is, is, is focused on women. Of course there’s not a lot of men that sign up for her website, uh, but she’s on all social media as well@tofitathome.com. Thank you guys so much for the support. We’ve definitely appreciate you guys being a part of this, and thank you for joining us here on the fit two fat to fit experience podcast. Don’t forget, if you love us, you know, please let us know. Subscribe to us on iTunes, leave us a five star review. We definitely would appreciate that and we’ll see you guys back here next week for another great episode and have a good one.
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