Ep. 5 with Cheryl Giambattista from Health Coach Cheryl

Barb McGrath 0:01
Welcome to Night views The Secret Life of entrepreneurs on 91.3 FM CJ tr. Regina community radio. We’re live with a local business owner who’s making a difference in y qR. Stay tuned to learn their secrets about what makes them tick. What helped them become successful and their role as a leader in our business community. You’re listening to your host, Barb McGrath, business owner and founder of the get get found on Google live program, and marketing expert who helps businesses succeed with ease using their website, social media and online reputation reputation. Our guest today is Cheryl Giambattista health coach with Health Coach Cheryl, she will talk about her simple swaps program, and why her clients are having such amazing success. Welcome, Cheryl. Thank you so much for having me, Barb. I’m really excited to share a little bit about my journey with you today. That’s awesome. Well, let’s let you kick it off. Tell us a little bit about yourself, what you do and how you got into health coaching.

Cheryl Giambattista 1:08
Okay, we’ll do. So I’m Cheryl Giambattista, and I’m actually very grateful. We’ve been married for over 30 years. And we have six children. And this summer, we just had our very first grandchild. So I have a very, very busy home life and family life. And I’m actually my education background is I actually have a BA with a major in psychology, and an education degree. So I was a teacher. But several years ago, well to be exact, like about 25 years ago. Now, when I was just a young mom, we had two children at the time, our oldest son ended up with a life threatening illness, he was actually diagnosed with leukemia. And as you can just imagine, that left us with just a real heart, it can stress a really scary time of our lives. And at that time, I just decided that I would do I wanted to do everything I possibly could to support our son and help him get back to health, along with step standard treatment, of course. So that’s sort of what took me into this whole health arena. And what I started to do was just the simple nutrient swaps is a lot of the ingredients that I was bringing into the house for cooking and putting my meals together. And so as I began just making those simple ingredients swaps, we just noticed that not only did Josh start feeling better, but the whole family seem to be to get a better level of health. So with that approach, that this is the approach that I have been able to take with with my clients, I come at it, it’s a very simple approach where we are really just making simple ingredients swaps.

Approach, simple and easy system that can help them get back on track and get their health back and really be feeling good in their not only in their energy level, but also in their confidence with their body shape. And oh, just by minute.

Barb McGrath 3:37
So Cheryl, that sounds really interesting. There are a number of weight loss fans out there. There are weight loss programs, but you’ve really built something from the ground up. This is your program, this is something that genuinely benefit benefited your family. So you talked a little bit about your son, Josh, and he was ill. Let’s start there. Josh is a new dad now, isn’t he? Yes.

Cheryl Giambattista 4:04
Yeah. She knew dad since June. So just a new little boy, they’ve given his way back. Yeah. And he just moved back from Vancouver, Barry. He’s doing his residency in oncology. And so I always say that his story is cancer with a happy ending. And so we’re just so grateful and so blessed that he’s feeling well, and has taken on a career in oncology.

Barb McGrath 4:30
Wow. So his whole life he he obviously knew his story and that shaped his future.

Cheryl Giambattista 4:36
Yeah, absolutely. Well, from the time he was about eight years old, he he said to me, Mom, I’m going to be a cancer doctor.

Barb McGrath 4:43
Oh, isn’t that something at eight years old already? Yeah. You know, honestly, at eight kids shouldn’t even understand that word. Yeah, that’s it’s so unfortunate. Okay, so I me, I tend to like Google quite a bit. Google and I are good friends. Usually Google will work the way I want them to. So I googled health coach in Regina, and probably, I don’t know, a dozen 15 different businesses came up. And some were would I would describe, again, that that fast type of program, right? Where yours is intended to be a long term program that people can really use to change their lives. Tell me how, when you’re, you’re talking with a client?

Cheryl Giambattista 5:32
How do you help them understand the difference? How do you differentiate? Okay, that’s a great question Barb. So when it when I think about his diet, or one of these quick fixes, for fat loss or for weight loss, I basically I think about it as being a project that would have a beginning and an end. And you know, there are steps to do in between the middle of that project. Now, when we’re done a project, what do we normally do, we go back to whatever we were doing before we started that project. So the same is with our health, if we look at this as a just a quick fix, we’re just going to do a diet for like, three months, or six months or whatever, then what happens when we come to the end of that project, a lot of times, you’re going to go back to a lot of the old ways that we were eating and some of our lifestyle, things that really weren’t serving us to help us get to our goal. So with this, because it’s just a gradual approach of adding in the simple swaps, it becomes a way of life, it really becomes a way of life. And the great thing is, is that as we start making these food choices that are going to balance our blood sugars, the cravings will leave us, we’re not going to be you know, plagued with those awful carb cravings. And then we’re going to be able to actually do this in an easy way. And we are going to feel so good, we’re going to be in tune with our body. And we will not want to end this project. We’re gonna want to stay, stay stick with it. I love that comparison to a project a project is something that starts and ends. And having managed some fairly large marketing projects, I can appreciate that. But you’re right, when you’re changing the way you’re living. This is something that you want to be sustainable. And certainly anytime you’re dieting, there’s some short term changes that you might make that are only intended to be short term. But I think everything that I’ve seen in your program is intended to be a long term, fixed solution lifestyle. So we really like that. Cheryl, can you give us a couple of examples of the swaps that might happen in your program? Okay, so when we talk about the swaps, I like to start with the carbs blocks, because this is the most important thing that we can do to start getting our health back, getting our microbiome in our gut balanced, having better brain chemicals to feel good and recall information. And to be able to manage our blood sugar. I mean, the carbs swaps are my number one, if, if you were going to do just anything out of my whole program, if you were going to do those, you are going to set yourself up for success, you’re going to start losing inches, you’re going to, you’re going to start feeling better. So some of those simple things that we can do. I’m married to an Italian. So of course, we love our cast app. So when we think about the carb swaps, where you want to look at maybe instead of having those, the white passes with the white flour, to be able to choose some that are whole grains that actually have the fiber still intact, because when we take away all that fiber, we’re going to, it’s going to increase our blood sugar a lot easier. So a lot of times we’ll just look at with the carbs, maybe we’re just looking at that sort of the whites. And so that’s look at our white flour, the white sugar, white races, and let’s see if we can choose varieties of those that have more protein, and especially more fiber to see down that sugar. And then we also have to watch our serving sizes on notice of a fee, you know, decide we’re having cool green pastel, but then we’re going to sit down and have two cups may be at one meal, and we don’t have any healthy fats or protein in there, that we’re still going to be not setting ourselves up for success. So I show my clients just had a look at their plate without getting out the scale. The measure like the measuring spoons, anything like that just looking at your plate, and you know half of that plate, you want to be half covered with all kinds of big some of those. plate, yeah, then we want to have about the size of our palm the palm of our hand as our protein. And then that other quarter of our plate would be our which may be starchy carbs, but we’re going to choose the low glycemic variety and then move on to add just a little bit of healthy fat in there as well.

Barb McGrath 9:53
So something you said there kind of tweaked for me one of the things that I’ve always heard if you will Want to try and lose some weight is to increase your protein. Can you explain that to us why why is protein such an important part? And why would increasing protein have an impact on our health.

Cheryl Giambattista 10:12
So in this program we aim to get for women, we’re aiming to get around 60 grams of protein a day. So that’s around 20 per meal. And the reason that we’re doing that is because as we are losing inches, we really want to hang on to our lean muscle mass, we do not want to be using our muscle as we’re aging after the age of 30, we’re losing a small percentage per year. So we really want to do all we can to hang on to that, okay, and then the protein is going to help us when we eat that with a meal, it’s going to help us it’s lower in low carbs, it’s not going to spike our blood sugar, it’s going to help keep blood sugar balanced. And it’s going to help us feel full and satisfied. It also helps us all those amino acids that we build from that out of that protein, help us with our brain chemicals, right. So that can help us feel satiated. And really help us with those cravings as well. And just the main thing is not getting hungry, so fast, like if you just have an apple for your snack.

Barb McGrath 11:12
And you know, we decided she was talking to me before we started the show. And I said oh, but I’m eating an apple. And now she’s gonna tell me.

Cheryl Giambattista 11:21
Awesome, we wanted to some some Whole Foods and fruits and veggies. But it’s kind of nice if we can add in maybe a handful of nuts, a little bit of nut butter, a little bit of protein with that Apple is going to help us feel full and satisfied for a lot longer. And it’s going to help to lower that the sugar level in that Apple.

Barb McGrath 11:42
Yeah. Excellent. Well, that sounds very good. So I forget when you were talking in the beginning, have you talked yet about you used to be a teacher and made this switch? Did you talk about that already,

Cheryl Giambattista 11:55
Just a little bit, I want to talk about why I decided to be become an entrepreneur, this was this is stepping out of my comfort zone that I was, you know, happy with a career I went, I took I have two degrees. So I spent a lot of time at university. But after the experience with Josh and seeing how, just by making these little food tweaks by with our nutrition, we could have greater health I it just stirred up a passion in me to help other families to be able to feel healthy so that they could be all they are created to be have all that energy for young moms to be able to have that energy for their families. And and then I guess deep down, I just don’t want to see any other mom, Grandma, busy dad have to face the fears that we faced with having a child, right. So my passion became just so powerful. And the awesome thing that I get to do though, is that I get to use my teaching degree inside my business. I’m always teaching

Barb McGrath 13:03
Dance, right? I suppose Yeah, you’re

Cheryl Giambattista 13:06
Inside my program. You know, my teaching skills are coming out my my organizational skills, and then with my be with the background in psychology, all the intuitive things that I learned through that have just brought so much to my program and to my clients. So

Barb McGrath 13:24
A that’s a really good point, Cheryl. So in many ways, it’s adult education. Now, instead of sort of children and classroom education, it’s just education from a different perspective. And this time you’re passing on your life education, as opposed to something that’s come from a textbook,

Cheryl Giambattista 13:39
Absolutely.

Barb McGrath 13:41
One of the things that I often hear business owners and entrepreneurs talk about is their business or their industry called them. So they didn’t go looking for the opportunity so much as it kind of landed in their lap. And it may have been some type of circumstance in life that you know, I suppose lost a job a sudden move. And that’s a little bit what I’m hearing in your story is you didn’t necessarily go looking to become a health coach, but instead life handed you something that you dealt with in a stellar fashion, and turned it into an opportunity. Yeah, no

Cheryl Giambattista 14:14
Huge learning curve, like you know, the whole technology thing. And at the beginning of my of my coaching business, I was working mostly just one on one with my clients. And now I have an online program. So with that online program comes a lot of technology pieces. So if I, as I’m speaking to entrepreneurs here, the one tip that I can give for you is that, you know, to really follow your passion, but then to really focus in on what you’re really good at. So my skills are that that time with my clients and the education part of it, that’s where my skills lie, not necessarily on the technology side. So then to be able to get find people you know, to Get people in place to be able to do those other areas that you’re not really, really good at, and your business is going to grow so, so, so much faster.

Barb McGrath 15:09
Yes. And I think that’s true for all businesses. If we try and do it all, we end up burning ourselves out, we get tired out and and, you know, to be honest, I think you start to run out of ideas. But when you bring people into the fold, and you share your business with others, you talk about the work you’re doing, or you or you’re not afraid to talk about your challenges. Anytime I’ve had those conversations with people, it’s it’s doubled the opportunity that’s in front of me because I get new ideas and new approaches. And I’ve always found that to be such a positive thing. So good for you for welcoming other people into your business and asking for help when you need it. As women so often, we’re not good at that asking for help. Sure, I think that’s one of our downfalls. So let’s think a little bit bigger than Health Coach Cheryl, let’s start to think on a national basis or even on a global basis. Are you seeing some trends in your industry? Is the industry growing? What’s happening in the big picture?

Cheryl Giambattista 16:10
The industry, the health coaching industry is really growing. There’s a number of schools, you know, across Canada, us very, very, there’s some very prominent prominent health coaches and holistic nutrition coaches out there that are and I think just because with with the internet, too, we can find them we can go online and watch their videos. And there really is a real food revolution going on, which is really, really exciting. Even if we think of the the choices that we have in our typical grocery stores now, like be most of the stores have, you know, a big organic section. Now, IGA just opened in my city, and they have an awesome organic section, lots of choices there. So customers are demanding that we are starting to read labels, we’re starting to, to really ask, you know, the managers at the store, can you bring this in and Costco to analysis new, the new Costco is opening, they say they’re going to have, you know, tons more organic and really good options for us. So we need it. This is a revolution. Absolutely. It really is.

Barb McGrath 17:19
Yes. So as someone who eats gluten free, I’ve watched that revolution over the last 10 or 12 years. And when I first was diagnosed celiac and needed to start, you know, removing gluten from my diet, I was lucky if I could get a rice cracker when we went to some restaurants. And now we don’t even think twice if we are going out for a meal where we’ll pick because Long gone are the days where there wasn’t somewhere we could go where there wasn’t something on the menu that was gluten free or could be made gluten free. So it has really changed as well. So I agree with you. There’s a big revolution happening in terms of our food, wanting to eat local, wanting to understand where our products produce, or food was sourced from. So I think we’re seeing a real shift that way. And I think it’s a very positive shift for all of us. Definitely. All right, you referenced earlier the large family you have and in fact, I happen to know that your sister has a large family too. So it Cheryl the other day that she’s just that big family kind of girl. And if you could see her, you’d know that she’s not a big girl at all. So not sure how she does it. But my point is, she’s got six children, a hubby who travels and has a new grandbaby. So how in the heck are you balancing all of this?

Cheryl Giambattista 18:32
Okay, so much to balance everything, I i’ve always use a calendar. So I take out my calendar, and I book into my calendar, all of my personal family activities that are going to be happening, that that is, that’s going to be first for me, that’s sort of the reason why I wanted to be an entrepreneur, that I would have that flexibility. And then during some of the online coaching and working with groups, I even have more flexibility. So I love that. So I booked in my family times first and because my husband travels and we still have a really busy home, I need to have that first in order to keep our marriage strong, to keep you know the kids happy and healthy. And to be able to have the time to actually live the life of a health coach. Right? You know, I want to be making those simple, delicious meals, I want to be walking the walk and you know, staying with a healthy lifestyle. So that comes first. And then I look in between there I have an online calendar. So when someone wants to book a call with me, they find out where you know what times of the day I have open and the book online and so then now I’m doing most of those as phone calls or video calls. I’m not doing a lot of driving to a home because all of that takes extra time. You know, I found ways to really streamline You know, my time that way. And then I’m working with groups of people. I have a Facebook group for my clients. So they’re there. getting lots of support from the group and the community beside you. And then I’ve got, you know, of course I pulled in people to help. I’ve got a virtual assistant that helps me with some of my, my facebook marketing and things like that. So I’ve called in help, so that I can maintain a balance and still just get so much joy out of my business. I absolutely love it. It doesn’t feel like work to me.

Barb McGrath 20:24
Wow. And that’s amazing to to spend the kind of time that you do at work. And yet, it’s not feeling like like work. That’s Yeah, that’s it. That’s everybody’s dream. Absolutely. So I’m just gonna do a quick check in with our listeners. You’ve got night views, The Secret Life of entrepreneurs on 91.3 FM, CJ tr, Regina, community radio, we’re introducing you to local business owners, and talking about acts of acts of Audacity. That’s a tongue twister for you, that are happening right here in our business community. One of the things that I always like to talk about when I talk with a business owner, Cheryl is their motivation. And you use the word passion before, I think there’s a lot of people who don’t have the good fortune to find the passion in their life. They try lots of things and nothing seems to click. So a congratulations to you, you’ve absolutely found that you found your niche. But what keeps you going, what makes you get out of bed in the morning and just run to go and do this thing you love that doesn’t feel like a job at all?

Cheryl Giambattista 21:30
I guess it would have to be my clients, when I see the results that they’re having. And the way that it’s changing not only their lives, these little simple changes that they’re making are absolutely changing their life changing their health, but they’re also trickling down to their whole family. And you know that the, the grammars are helping the daughters. And you know, even in my situation, I have a daughter, she’s a teacher at red bell. And she teaches home economics she’s bringing the spot into the classroom. Yeah, she sends me pictures of some of the food that they’re making. And so like this is trickling down, and we’re just creating this, this tradition of good nutrition in our families. And so and and just the, the friendships that I built with my clients, the friendships are just incredible. Yes. And so I that that’s what keeps me awake. Yeah, that’s what keeps me going.

Barb McGrath 22:23
I love when you talk about the trickle down effect. So I won’t get on my soapbox, because this is your show, not mine. But I am absolutely passionate about starting to teach children nutrition, right from the beginning. And of course, we hear in society on a very regular basis how children are experiencing obesity issues, and high blood pressure and diabetes and things like that. And I think we all have a role to play in that. And in fact, as parents, we need to teach them the foundation. But I think that carries over to the school. So knowing that your daughter is taking what she’s learned from you into the classroom, I think is amazing. I think there’s too many times where we still see sugar pour into the classroom. It’s not the teachers fault. It’s not the parents fault. It’s a combination of everyone together, that adds up. And I have a child who doesn’t do well with sugar. And in fact, she’s probably listening. So hello, Catarina. Um, and so it’s become a real challenge for us where kids have access to so much junk food now. It’s hard for us as parents to say no, because we’re always the ones who have to say no.

Cheryl Giambattista 23:38
Yeah, right. So the one thing that I do with that bar to help combat some of that is I have lots and lots of recipes there, they still tea still a little bit sweet. We might be using sweeteners, like then we do, we’ll do the honey maple syrup for getting rid of the white sugar in a lot of them. And then I’m just making sure that they have enough healthy fats and protein in there. So they still, you know, they taste really great. And they’re not going to spike the blood sugar. So we need to give our kids those options. And so many of these I’ve got various cookies and coconut bars and things like that, that the kids can actually make themselves I didn’t want to shop at the library in White City in the spring. And we need like four or five of these little you know, healthy snacks. Yep. That they still look and taste like a cookie. But they’re getting their blood sugar balance.

Barb McGrath 24:25
Yes. So it’s gonna keep them full longer. So they’re not going to crave that next snack. Yeah, right.

Cheryl Giambattista 24:30
Yeah, I just have to get a little tricky and and come up with some good swaps for them that are going to be theory similar to what they’re used to. Mm hmm.

Barb McGrath 24:38
Yeah. So surely you shared a story with me before we started today. And if you don’t want to share the story, again, just kind of give me the nod from your side. But Cheryl’s business as she’s talked about, is primarily online. So her clients are all over the province all over the country. So there’s lots of phone calls, and there’s webinars and sharing sharing a story with me about a webinar. And you know, I can I can smile because having been there and done that I get it. Cheryl, would you be willing to share that story?

Cheryl Giambattista 25:10
Yeah. Okay, I’ll share my technology issues. So I was doing my very first webinar, or it was a zoom webinar. So I had 40 minutes, because it was still kind of the free version of zoom. Very first one, it was going to be like around that 30 minute mark, my husband was home to help me with some of the technology, we thought we had it all case. And we were starting that webinar. And you know, I went through the whole entire webinar, see, not knowing for sure if anybody was actually on there or not. Because nobody was responding. There was nothing really going on. But I had to just go through all my slides presented as if I had like, 50 to 100 people or whatever online. It was so stressful. And then when I finished I realized, yes, in fact, no one was online. No. Oh. So they resolve that crap and everything. And then just to have the technology fail. So what happened was there somehow we had created two links to ID numbers for this call. And then wrong one was sent out to my email list posted on Facebook all over the No,

Barb McGrath 26:17
No. So I presume, though, everyone was still able to tune into the show. It was Yeah, after the information and well, good. And you know, we all hope to have those technology glitches and Cheryl witness would have been a little bit earlier today. So I certainly get it. All right, well, it looks like we are pretty much out of time. Ah, so I’d like to thank you the listeners for joining us here today on 91.3 FM CJ tr Regina community radio for night views The Secret Life of entrepreneurs. And thank you, Cheryl, from Health Coach Cheryl and your simple swaps program, hearing you talk about the small incremental changes that you can make in your in your nutrition for long term longevity is is very interesting. It’s something that I’m personally quite passionate about. I will be back here on September 19, with Jordan McFarlane, from the connexus business incubator, and he’s going to talk a little bit about the status of that project and the long term benefits to our province. I think we’ve all heard quite a bit of both the project. And you know, I was hoping and talking to Jordan that we could hear from him how we will all benefit. If you’d like to be a guest on the show, you can reach me by email at Barb at Above the Fold canada.ca or reach out directly on Facebook or Instagram, again at Above the Fold Canada. You can also submit questions in advance of the live show on our Facebook page. I’m your host Barb McGrath, local business owner of Above the Fold Canada and I thank you for the opportunity to be here today. Sherry will be back with you next week at 12 o’clock. Remember, you worked hard for your success. Don’t keep it a secret