10 Micro Habits Made Her Lose 20 Pounds While Being a “Busy Worker Mom"

If you have a lot of weight to lose, it can seem hopeless and impossible. However, Samantha Costa, a 23-year-old influencer, lost a whopping 60 pounds in 3 months. In a viral YouTube video, she explains exactly how she did it, and a lot of it had to do with shifting her perspective and overall approach to weight loss.

Losing 60 Pounds in 6 Months with PCOS

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She starts with her backstory: In 2018 she was diagnosed with PCOS (polycystic ovary syndrome), which resulted in weight gain. “I fluctuate weight a lot and it also affects my periods. With that being said, because I was diagnosed with PCOS, I put on a lot of weight very fast, and it wasn't a type of weight that was healthy,” she said. Costa, who is five-foot-one, topped the scale at around 200 pounds. “Being in a place where I knew I wasn't healthy was really scaring me.” At the time she was able to drop 50 to 60 pounds in “five to six months” by going to Orangetherory and eating right. “I think I weighed around 196 pounds and I got down to around 135,” she specified.

Related: #1 Way to Flatten Your Stomach for Women, According to a Pelvic Floor Expert

The Power of Whole Grains

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Her main dietary change at the time involved swapping out white carbs with whole grain and whole wheat. “I literally had grilled chicken, pasta, grated cheese, and tomato sauce every single day because that's what made me happy,” she said. After graduating from college in May 2022, “and I honestly was a very steady weight of around probably 129 pounds to 140 throughout all of my senior year of college,” she felt like she was at a healthy weight for herself around 135 pounds. She spent the summer lifeguarding. “I was having a really fun time, and honestly everything was going very well,” she continued.

A Stressful Job Ruined Her Health and Happiness

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However, in August she started her “big job at a big four company” and it was “the downfall of everything,” she claims. “I'm not going to talk too much about it, but the stress of that job, which I am no longer working in, was very, very hard for me.” She stopped working out and spent most of her free time isolating. Over a period of about 7 months she probably gained 60 to 70 pounds, and was “very, very sad,” she says. “I wasn't happy with how I looked and I was having a hard time with it, but it was more that I knew I wasn't healthy and I knew I needed to get healthy because of this. I would always tell myself, ‘You know what? You did it once. You can definitely do it again.’”

From 10,000 Steps to 500

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She couldn’t motivate herself to go to fitness studio again, “something that I used to love going to do,” she says. While she used to walk 10,000 steps a day, she “was lucky if I hit probably 500 steps a day because I was always at my computer, always doing something for work, and there was really just no time for me to do it.”

She Lost 10 Pounds in a Week and Kept Going

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Every day she looked in the mirror and told herself “in three months from now, you will look so much better. You'll feel so much better, which is the most important, and you will want to do things because you started.” Eventually she started seeing progress, claiming that she lost 10 pounds in one week, which she knew was water weight. Within a few weeks she noticed a “little bit of a difference” and once she started to see that difference, “it was a lot easier to believe in myself and notice that there was real progress happening and that there was change happening, which allowed me to keep going within my journey.”

Related: 11 Shoulder-Sculpting Workouts for Impressive Definition

The Secrets to Her Success

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She revealed that she did keto, which is “very hard to sustain,” she admits. “It was very hard for me to eat a certain amount of carbs every single day, and it was very hard for me to cut out sugar. I'm someone who loves sugar, but I knew that in order to be in a healthy place again, and in order to get to my goal in the most efficient way, especially with summer coming up, I needed to do something that would really change and really allow my body to adapt.” She also emphasizes the importance of protein. “Eating carbs is something that obviously we all need. I am not saying don't eat carbs. Please eat your macros. Please eat carbs. Please allow yourself to have the energy that you need. I'm just saying what I did was I lowered the amount of carbs that I ate, but I was still eating enough to feel energized to be able to go to the gym and to give my body what it needs.”

She Increased Intake of Proteins and Exercised

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Amping up your protein intake may help you lose weight. According to clinical trials, consuming more protein than the recommended dietary allowance not only reduces body weight (BW), but also enhances body composition by decreasing fat mass while preserving fat-free mass (FFM) in both low-calorie and standard-calorie diets. She also went back to fitness studio four to five times a week, starting with gentle workouts and working her way up to more intense ones. She also recommends taking rest days.

Stay Motivated and Positive on Your Journey

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“In the beginning, you're probably going to feel like you can't do it and it's probably going to feel impossible, and if you are someone who doesn't feel like that, I give you so much credit because I've been there so many times and I felt like it was impossible every single time,” she adds. “The number one thing I want to tell you is to prove yourself wrong. Prove every single person that may have doubted you wrong. The only thing that matters is that you believe in yourself. The only thing that matters is that you have the mindset that will allow you to feel better, and every single time you question yourself, make one of those videos, take progress pictures, tell yourself that you are so much better than you were even one day ago, and if you are really having trouble starting, just try for one day.”

Related: Fitness Expert's $5 a Day Meal Plan for Fat Loss

💪🔥Body Booster: Increasing your protein intake and decreasing your carbohydrates is a scientifically backed tactic for weight loss. However, you still need a sufficient amount of carbs to stay energized.

Do you want to lose weight and change your life for the better? Minnesota mom Sabrina Osland struggled with her health most of her life. However, going on a family vacation sparked a change, motivating her to adopt a healthy lifestyle by habit stacking, changing her approach to eating, and incorporating exercise into her life. Here is her story.

She Topped the Scales at 266 Pounds

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“I'm Sabrina Osland and I struggled with weight all of my life. In 2014, I got married and focused on my relationship, my job, and my teenage son. Everyone else came first and I put myself on the back railroad and my heaviest, I weighed 266 pounds,” she tells Today in a segment.

Something Happened on Vacation That Sparked Change

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However, she hit “a breaking point when I was made to register as extra weight during a helicopter ride in Alaska with my son,” she says. “I was filled with sham, and for me, it was the last straw. So after my trip, I decided it was time for a change.”

She Started Walking

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She then discussed a few simple changes she made to jump-start her weight loss. “First, I started by carving out 30 minutes of my day to take a walk,” she says.

And, She Switched Up Her Diet

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“Then I switched up my diet,” she says. She replaced her usual pizza dinner with “healthier options” like chicken and a salad, she says.

She Also Joined a Strength Training Group

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She also added other exercises to her routine. “Eventually, I joined a strength training group, and their support has truly made a huge impact on my weight loss journey,” she says.

She Lost Over 100 Pounds in a Little Over a Year

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“In a little more than a year, I've lost more than 100 pounds, and I'm not looking back,” she explains. “It still hasn't resonated quite yet that I'm not that person,” she says about her 130-pound weight loss. “I still will do double takes whenever I'm looking or walking by a mirror. Like, wait, who, who is this person?”

She Focused on Three Pillars

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She explains that she focused on three different pillars. “How I moved my body, water, and what I was putting into my body,” she says.

She Started Eating Off a Salad Plate

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“One of the first simple things that I did was just to start eating off of like a salad plate,” she reveals. “So oftentimes you're trying to control your portion sizes, but then you have this ginormous plate and you feel like you're not satisfied,” she says. “Just starting eating off of a smaller plate naturally helped control my portion size, but then also made me feel full at the same time.”

She Practiced Habit Stacking

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She also practiced habit stacking. “I would focus on one thing that I wanted to do, a behavior I wanted to change, and then focus on that for a week. And then I would continue to build off of that.” For example she would focus on moving her body 30 minutes every day. “Then once I was able to do that for 30 minutes every day, I would add on another new habit, 15 minutes and add on until it becomes a habit.”

She Slowed Down Her Eating

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She also stopped eating super fast. She did this by putting my fork down in between bites. “Like, my food isn't going anywhere, so why am I in a hurry to eat it? So just taking that simple step and putting it down, um, really just helped the whole transformation,” she explained.

She Got Motivation From Her Strength Training Group

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And, she joined a group strength training program. “They've been super incredible in my transformation, not only from an accountability standpoint, but just from a motivation standpoint as well too. We're all in the gym and when you have everyone working together for a common goal, just that environment and that energy that it creates, there's a little competitiveness,” she says, adding that it not only helps motivate but inspires.

Her Son Is Also a “Huge Motivation”

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Her 19-year-old son is “a huge motivation” to her as well. “As I was starting to change my behaviors, I realized that as I was looking back at him, he had incorporated a lot of the bad habits that I had done, whether it was eating straight from the bag,” she says. “And so it was super important for me to be able to set him up for success. And so I wanted to go back and change my habits so that I can help him as well and just have him be successful in the future.”

Finally, She Makes Health and Wellness Fun

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She also recommends making health and wellness fun. “If you're not doing something that's fun, you're not gonna stick with it,” she says. She recommends “different activities, whether it's walking 10,000 steps a day or getting in and doing a group fitness class.” Just “different things to really keep yourself motivated and have fun while you're doing it. And enjoy the time with your family as well,” she says.

Aim for 10,000 Steps a Day

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How much should you walk to lose weight? A 2018 study published in the journal Obesity found a link between 10,000 steps a day and weight loss and weight management. Other studies published by the Journal of American Medical Association (JAMA) in JAMA Neurology and in JAMA Internal Medicine also linked walking 10,000 steps a day to less dementia and less cardiovascular disease overall, with less heart disease, less heart failure, and fewer strokes.

Strength Training Has Lots of Scientific Backing

There is a lot of science backing up strength training for weight loss. According to the Mayo Clinic, strength and weight training help reduce body fat, preserve and increase lean muscle mass, and burn calories more efficiently. Strength training may also help you:

• Develop strong bones
• Manage your weight
• Enhance your quality of life
• Manage chronic conditions
• Sharpen your thinking skills.

And if you enjoyed this article, take advantage of these 15 Quick Ways to Lose Body Fat Percentage in a Week.