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Living in the Sweet Spot:
Interview with Kay Loughrey
By Carin Chea
Kay Loughrey doesn’t just lead you toward your weight loss goal, she helps you live out your best life.
The Registered Dietitian-Nutritionist and Healthy Eating Coach is preeminent in her field and has been featured in multiple major publications and news outlets.
But, what makes Loughrey successful is her innate understanding of why people over-eat and resort to unhealthy diet habits. After all, a problem can only be solved if its roots are identified and addressed.
Loughrey’s connection as a health and weight loss coach is deep. Having developed an over-eating habit from childhood in order to cope with abuse, she struggled for years with fads and yo-yo dieting.
Loughrey was able to free herself from vicious cycles when she finally developed a genuinely healthy relationship with food.
And now, through her private practice (Sweet Life Wellness) as well as her book, Happy Life at a Healthy Weight, she shares her practical wisdom and expertise with the world.
You share this on your website, but could you tell us why you became a nutritionist?
When I was eight-years-old I started an unhealthy relationship with food. I had a trauma that launched into years of hiding and shame. I turned to food to comfort myself. I over-ate for years, and yo-yo dieted for decades.
My mom was also a baker who loved to make sweets. I got a lot of satisfaction from the warm chocolate chip cookies she made for me. That’s where my food problems started. I did lose around 350 pounds, but it wasn’t all at once.
I had to cure my own bad eating habits first. I loved chocolate and sugar and didn’t care about any other foods. It wasn’t a good thing for my health, but I did come to realize food was controlling me and it compelled me to do something about it.
I got an undergraduate degree in dietetics and a graduate degree in public health nutrition. Over the years, I made a lot of changes in my lifestyle and eating habits.
At one point, I was a vegetarian for seven years. I felt, especially with my weight going up and down, I wanted to help other people because it’s such a massive issue in our country.
After 27 years, I left public service to help individuals. I worked at places like NIH [National Institutes of Health], and the National Cancer Institute to launch a campaign to get Americans to eat more fruits and vegetables. I worked with a number of organizations, both governmental and nonprofit, in promoting health.
How long have you been in private practice now?
It's my 12th anniversary!
Happy anniversary! What made you decide to start a private practice 12 years ago?
It’s my passion and purpose. I actually left a six figure income because I was really frustrated that there was a lack of weight loss solutions out there. Diets help you lose weight, but they don’t help you keep it off.
Most people go on a diet, they lose 50 pounds, but then they regain 50 pounds, and more. That was the reason why I made a career move. I knew what I wanted to do, and I went for it. I wanted to help people lose weight and keep it off. That means not going on these crazy diets.
What I offer is a comprehensive lifestyle change approach. It’s beyond dieting. It’s the way we live.
I felt compelled to do something about this to really take a stand because I saw so many people were struggling like me. I saw people were getting sicker and sicker with what was then known as the twin epidemics of obesity and diabetes.
I looked at the data, and saw that the number of people in the US who had diabetes grew from 1.6 million in 1958 to 23.4 million in 2015. I’m sure it’s much higher now.
And, the food industry is alarming: They made 8.33 trillion dollars in 2023 for the first time ever in the US. It just keeps getting higher and higher, churning out cheap and super-processed food products. I wouldn’t even call it “food.” They’re food products.
People are also getting sicker and sicker and taking more medications. I couldn’t stand by anymore and watch this happen. I was doing good work but not on this issue.
Now nearly 75% of Americans are overweight or obese and obesity can cause 40 different medical conditions.
That was very effective. I feel like I got a Cliff Notes version of a much-needed wake up call.
It’s true: We’re eating a lot more. We’re eating 1000 calories more a day than previously and it’s causing even more weight gain. And now, we hardly have to move.
The crux of the matter is that food has gotten cheaper. It used to take a huge portion of the household budget.
Tell us how you help your clients.
I work with people who are adults who need to lose 20 pounds of more.
My new book is called Happy Life at a Healthy Weight and it emphasizes living an abundant life at the weight you want to be and looking in the mirror and loving who you see.
One big issue is that (especially with women in particular) food and shame go together. That’s why I subtitled the book “Creating a Shame Free, Healthy Relationship with Food and Life.”
I have three main points in the book. The first one is: The root of shame and food. One of those roots is trauma, which is what I experienced as a child. There are the norms around any body image.
I’ll never forget this picture I saw of Michelle Obama. She had a tiny bump on her stomach. She is in great shape, right? But maybe she had just eaten lunch. She got so many comments on her body because of that one picture.
That really bleeds into what I work with my clients, which is the second point: Eating and how it starts. Where does that emotional eating start?
Katie is the one client I worked the longest with on this. Her shame came from her family of origin. They wanted no conflict. In so many words, she was told, “Don’t talk about anything. Keep it under wraps.”
She was a friendly kid and wanted to connect with people. Her underlying trigger was loneliness, and yet she was living it out every day, at home in her adult life. Her trigger was sitting in front her TV.
She started with three beers, then she went on to a bag of chips, then ended with a bowl of ice cream. She felt lonely as a child, and now as an adult.
There are five steps to stop being controlled by food, which is the third idea of the book. It’s easy to turn to food when something is missing.
Katie stopped doing these behaviors and lost weight from our partnership together. I’ve helped many clients using this.
What are these five steps?
The first one is: What is your trigger? I’ll use Katie as an example for these steps. The trigger with Katie was when she turned on her TV.
Step number two is: What is your specific food craving? For Katie it was the beer and the chips and the ice cream.
Third is: You need to find a way to interrupt this pattern. In a way, people engage in unconscious behavior. They’re going into fight or flight when they reach for their food. You have to stop that cycle.
How do you interrupt that cycle mid-stream? I help develop a powerful interrupter for my clients.
For example, one of my clients, Phil, was a people-pleaser and he would reward himself with M&Ms. He gained 50 pounds on M&Ms.
You have to ask: “What’s more important to you? What’s more important to you than these M&Ms?” Phil said, “My two-year-old daughter. I want to be around. I have high blood pressure already and I could have a stroke.” That empowered Phil to stop in his tracks.
Four: What do you really want? Phil really wanted to be there for his little girl when she grew up. Katie was lonely and wanted connection.
We did these work in private, one-on-one sessions. You can’t do this with a beer can or M&Ms in your hands. They then use the skills we developed in session back at home.
Finally, what is your best option instead of eating? Katie wanted to be with people. Katie’s best option was to call her sister and somebody she really loved. Beer, ice cream, and chips can’t cure her loneliness.
It sounds like a lifestyle, rather than deprivation, which is a relief.
I want to emphasize that you can live the life you want to live and be at the wight you want to be. It’s about loving yourself and being at the right weight for you.
You can eat whatever you want; you just have to change how much and how often you eat those things.
I’m trying to free people from this burden that they’re not living the life they want.
What inspired you to write your book?
It's my life work. I can only see so many people with my program. I felt like the book was a good how-to manual and is accessible to anyone who has the need and drive.
What is one piece of advice you’d like to tell your younger self?
We all have to go through something in life. You can learn from your biggest challenge. My biggest challenge was the suffering I had in childhood. I comforted myself with food due to the trauma I suffered when I was eight years old.
I don’t know if we can escape the lessons we’ve learned. Stuff happens. I feel like no matter what, you can break free like I did from food triggers and old habits that have caused you shame and caused you to over-eat.
It’s really taking a stand for yourself. Instead of beating up on ourselves, there are ways to break through old habits or patterns or beliefs. A lot of times, it’s what people believe about themselves.
It’s that old saying, “Whether you think you can or think you can't, you're right.” Give yourself a chance to live the life you want to have.
For more information, please visit www.SweetLifeWellness.com
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