WarriorBabe's Story: Eating More and Lifting After 40

Nikkiey: Hi, I'm Nikkiey.

Maggie: I'm Maggie.

Andrea: I'm Andrea.

Nikkiey: And we are WarriorBabe. WarriorBabe exists because back in the day, I saw so many women struggling with restrictive dieting. Online marketing was telling women to eat less and move more, do 1,200-calorie diets or the next six-week shreds to get these abs. And it was just confusing women so much more.

So I started my own personal fitness journey, and I was able to understand how much food we actually needed to fuel our body. And it was so much more than what we were being told. And how to train, which was actually training less, not more, and focusing on strength training, because that's what actually changes our body.

So that set me off on wanting to share that mission with so many more women once I found the answers for myself. And so now it's my mission, and our mission, to be able to help more women understand how much to eat, what to eat, and what's actually going to fuel the results so that they can feel confident in their own skin.

Maggie: My first conversation with Nikkiey happened over Instagram. I got a DM from her, and I knew right off the bat who she was. So I thought, what's this young girl saying about menopause? What's she talking about? The more I got to know her, the more I saw how genuine her purpose was. She had been through it herself. I had been through it myself. And her purpose was to help and educate women on having a much better life than what the media was telling them.

I immediately saw that she had a really well-run company, with a team that she cared about and that cared about her, and WarriorBabes all over the place that were wanting and needing and hungry for this information. And I knew that's where I wanted to be.

Andrea: My first conversation was when Nikkiey approached me to be on our podcast, The WarriorBabe Show. I had been in my own recovery stage after a helicopter crash, and through that whole traumatic journey. So I felt honored to be able to share my story with more women and share the empowerment that you can have through resilience and coming back from almost losing your life or losing your mobility.

Then after that podcast, she saw that connection of how I could be an even bigger support to WarriorBabe by joining them. And how cool is this, to share this message and have that team that's already been built? This is a company I can just join and be a bigger voice to the whole community that she already built, and to more women, and spread that message even bigger.

Maggie: About five or six years ago is when things came to a head. I was probably feeling worse than I had ever felt. I didn't want to work anymore. I felt like I couldn't perform at work anymore. It was hard to even get up in the morning. I felt like my marriage was crumbling. My kids were all moving out. Life felt hard. And I thought it was normal to feel the way I felt. I'd been told that was normal.

And of course, I went to doctor after doctor after doctor and just got put on more and more antidepressants. No one ever talked to me about my hormones or menopause. So when I started researching myself and figuring out what was actually going on, I could go to my doctor, and I knew the right questions to ask.

When I started aligning my lifestyle and getting the big pieces in place, then I could add the smaller puzzle pieces, which was hormone therapy, getting on top of that and getting optimal hormone levels, and what that did for me mentally, physically and emotionally. So now my workouts counted. I was able to get off my antidepressants. I was able to get up in the morning and feel excited about the day.

I think one of the biggest misconceptions women have is that you shouldn't feel like that anymore, that your life's declining, and that's just what happens when you get older. And I promise you, it is the opposite. You can feel happier and more vibrant than you ever have. This is the finale. This is the second act. This is where the fun should be starting.

Nikkiey: From the 21,000 women that we've coached, this one story sticks with me: Cheryl Beaver. She is an OG. She was with WarriorBabe for about four years, and she came into the program doing what the majority of women that age were doing: not eating enough, overtraining, and confused. She thought she was eating healthy, but she wasn't eating enough.

But she came to me wanting to build muscle, so she was okay that she was going to maybe put on a little bit of weight. So we spent about nine months to a year working her up to around 3,000 calories, at 57 years old. And she put on a little weight. She put on around 20 pounds. But with that, she was changing her body composition. She was building muscle underneath it.

Then we went into her first cut to reveal the work that she had done, and she looked incredible. She had muscle. She looked more toned. And she was like, "Well, Nikkiey, I'm not done. I want to do more. I want to go into another build." And I'm like, okay. So we started to reverse her back up into another build, and she was getting closer to the 3,000 calories again, maybe 2,800. And then she put on more muscle. Then we did the cut again, and she looked even better. She gained more muscle at 57 years old. A completely different woman from picture A to picture B, from before to after.

If you're watching this and you're still on the fence: trust us now, believe us later. Trust us now that we're going to give you the right tools, the resources, the accountability and the support to get you on the right path. It may feel uncomfortable. It may feel against the norm. But trust us now and believe us later. In six months to a year to 18 months, you're going to be where you want to be, as long as you stay on the path and follow the direction. Trust us now and believe us later.

Maggie: I second that. Absolutely.