Mikki Williden, PhD, Auckland (2025)

30/09/2025

Anything else just makes it infinitely harder to successfully lose weight and keep it off.

Minimum 100g of protein, spread across minimum of 2 meals, it doesn’t have to be equally distributed, but ideally your first meal and last meal has a good amount in them as you are either coming out of, or about to enter, an overnight fast where you don’t eat for several hours. For fat loss, it is recommended to have 2g/kg body weight to optimise for fat loss (or higher even) but 1.6g/kg is totally fine.

Sleep is your greatest recovery tool, and aiming for at LEAST 6-7 hours (ideally 7-8 for most) on a consistent basis. This requires you to be disciplined around going to bed and getting up at roughly the same time each day, regardless of the day.

Fibre keeps you fuller, slows digestion, provides bulk to the food you’re eating and sends signals to your brain that helps with satiety. If you tolerate fibre then aim for vegetables and fruits that increase this, aiming for ~14g/1000 Cal as a minimum

Ideally a minimum of 7-8000 steps a day to ensure that daily movement is prioritised which allows for a larger calorie expenditure across the day.

Having a training goal and sticking to it, keeping a record of it so you can continue to progress (even if it’s just a record of how often and how long).

Monitoring in diet, exercise and sleep (as examples) are all related to long term weight loss success, long after the weight has been lost.

If you don’t have structure and routine around your lifestyle habits then you have chaos. And it makes it that much more difficult to make good decisions. It’s necessary to have willpower, but you don’t want to always have to exert it - it’s a rare individual that can rely on this alone, amidst chaos, and be successful long term.

PMID: 31247944 PMID: 37840409 PMID: 33455563 PMID: 16002825

28/09/2025

💥 275km across the desert… DONE! (Well, 277km after a little wrong turn on Day 4 😅)

Hubster and I just wrapped up the Grand to Grand Ultra—7 days, 6 stages, and 275km of sand dunes, slot canyons, heat, and altitude, from the Grand Canyon to the pink cliffs of the Grand Staircase. Brutal. Beautiful. Life-changing.

Training started in June: hiking, running, strength work (incl leg day), sauna sessions for heat, and sand dune practice. We focused on volume over intensity—long back-to-back days to train our bodies to do it again.

As a nutritionist, you’d think I had it perfectly planned—but experience always trumps textbook. I fuelled on 30–40g carbs/hour: Hive Energy gels, Precision Hydration cubes, Clif bars, and salami sticks for savoury breaks. Ketones (Audacious Nutrition) were clutch for focus on the long days, and Curranz blackcurrant extract helped with recovery and gut stability (4 caps 2h before start, 2 caps every 4h (no GI issues—big win!).

In camp post run: 100g carbs within 45 min: noodles, protein shakes, Radix meals, tea, and the occasional stroopwafel. Simple, digestible, and consistent. We overpacked (again 😅), but left knowing exactly how to dial it in next time.

From a monster 87km sand day to pulling cactus pricks out of my toe, there were highs and lows. But every single day delivered magic: thunderstorms, desert stars, fire pits, and pizza + full-sugar Sprite at the finish (my 4th full sugar soda of the year—and totally worth it). I came in 1st supported female, Hubster 2nd supported male

We didn’t know if we could do it. The distance wasn’t scary—but the terrain, heat, and sleep deprivation? Totally unknowns. But we did it. Together.
And the best part? The people. It’s hard to make friends as adults—but these races bring together the best kind of humans. Suffering, supporting, and sharing the joy of just getting through it.

Huge thanks to everyone who sent love from afar. To Kim and Ali and Doug (the best), to Colin and Tess and all of our new best friends (the other participants).

And to and for fuelling us to the finish. 💜
 Codes: MIKKIPEDIA (Curranz) / MIKKI10 (Hive)

19/09/2025

It’s normal to gain back some weight in the course of normal life.

No matter how good your approach was at helping you protect muscle, keeping you adaptive and responsive to the diet and exercise inputs. No matter how much you loved the approach and its ability to give you a flexible mindset around food and training, you can still find yourself a few kilograms heavier than you would like in a given year.

Normalising this will help you not catastrophise it. We will go through periods of our life where despite our best intentions, more important health, family or career issues take priority.

Your well embedded habits will stop that 5 kg weight gain from turning into 15kg. I’m not talking about yo yo dieting. But some of those old default comfort behaviours that soothe in a time of stress may show up for you.

The thing to remember is that when you are ready, you still have those skills that allowed you to release the weight. You know what to do. You can switch it on again and, once you realise that you need to, you can pick it up.

You’re not starting over.
You don’t need a shiny new ball 🪩
You just need to execute the strategy (as long as it emphasises strength training and protein + fibre).

Trust that you will.

Self monitoring and keeping a food diary, tracking calories properly, checking off training sessions and steps, and weighing yourself can all be tools to help you minimise this too.

PS IG’s suggestion of Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’ feels entirely appropriate here 😅

19/09/2025

It’s normal to gain back some weight in the course of normal life.

No matter how good your approach was at helping you protect muscle, keeping you adaptive and responsive to the diet and exercise inputs. No matter how much you loved the approach and its ability to give you a flexible mindset around food and training, you can still find yourself a few kilograms heavier than you would like in a given year.

Normalising this will help you not catastrophise it. We will go through periods of our life where despite our best intentions, more important health, family or career issues take priority.

Your well embedded habits will stop that 5 kg weight gain from turning into 15kg. I’m not talking about yo yo dieting. But some of those old default comfort behaviours that soothe in a time of stress may show up for you.

The thing to remember is that when you are ready, you still have those skills that allowed you to release the weight. You know what to do. You can switch it on again and, once you realise that you need to, you can pick it up.

You’re not starting over.
You don’t need a shiny new ball 🪩
You just need to execute the strategy (as long as it emphasises strength training and protein + fibre).

Trust that you will.

Self monitoring and keeping a food diary, tracking calories properly, checking off training sessions and steps, and weighing yourself can all be tools to help you minimise this too.

PS it feels like IG suggestion of Journey’s Don’t Stop Believin’ is entirely appropriate here 😅

18/09/2025

If you drop your carbs you need to bump up your sodium. I know. This goes against everything you read about salt. Which is totally overblown for most people who don’t have high blood pressure or insulin resistance. But I digress.

Sodium helps pull water into cells. When we drop carb intake we drop our stored carbohydrate. For every gram of carbs you store, you store an additional 3-4g of water. So when these drop, so does your water stores. Cue fatigue, headaches, energy, feeling light headed (esp as your blood pressure drops).

Adding in sodium such as a product like LMNT, MNRL or even just plain salt can help rescue your sodium levels, your water levels and make you feel better. We have sodium-potassium pumps in every cell in our body and need a steady supply of both. When you drop carbs and processed food (as often happens when you go on a diet) then you can be lacking in sodium. Hopefully you have increased your vegetables and fruit so the potassium isn’t a problem!

16/09/2025

IMO nuts for most people are better as part of a meal and not as a snack.

It is so easy to over eat them and depending on the nut, you could be mindlessly consuming 400+ calories without really getting the benefit of feeling like you’ve eaten as most people don’t feel that satisfied on just nuts.

It’s not that nuts aren’t ‘healthy’ - raw fresh nuts are good sources of vit E and monounsaturated fat among other things - but they have a health halo 😇 which can mean we don’t think about their energy density (calories they provide).

And calories matter. Many people who are trying to make choices to help them lose body fat overeat on foods like nuts (avocado and olive oil would be others).

Obviously they still ‘count’ as part of your meal, but throwing them on a salad, chopping the bigger ones up a bit, means a little can go a long way.

And nuts aren’t a great choice if you’re looking to bump up your dietary protein intake. They contribute to protein, yes, but it’s minimal and are a way better source of fat.

14/09/2025

This comes up all the time with my clients, my groups, my friends—actually, with just about everyone.

We’re so conditioned not to offend or upset anyone else that we end up saying yes when we want to say no, or shelving our own needs because it’s “easier” to keep the peace.

That doesn’t mean empathy doesn’t matter. It does. But too often, it comes at the expense of our own long-term happiness and goals.

Without boundaries, we lose sight of what actually matters to us. And when you keep pushing down what you really want, your body and mind notice—whether that shows up as frustration, guilt, shame, or emotional eating to quiet it all down.

This isn’t about being selfish. It’s about sustainability. You can’t pour from an empty cup.

And at some point, something can go amiss. Your body keeps score, after all. This is intricately tied to your diet, your exercise and your health. 🌱

(Music choice inspired by The Rock’s 2000 countdown 😂- there are a lot of songs to work through - up to 972 and counting down)

13/09/2025

To say that medications mimic our own GLP 1 production is either showing a lack of knowledge or is a claim intent to sell you something.

Our endogenous GLP 1 is released in response to food, has a short half life and is inactivated by other enzymes and may increase 2-4 x above baseline depending on the person. It might peak around 30-60 min after eating and are elevated for a couple of hours.

GLP 1 analog/agonist drugs amplify the action of GLP 1 but engineered to last much longer, resist degradation and circulate at higher effective concentrations- maybe 100x or way more (looking at reports) above baseline levels.

They are dosed that way to overcome the GLP 1 natural 1-2 min half life.

The dosing of the drug changes how it interacts with the gut and the brain, compared to our natural secretion.

They in no way mimic our natural secretion. Completely different.

And don’t buy into these ridiculous GLP 1 patches etc I’ve seen doing the rounds either. Absolute complete waste of your money.

13/09/2025

I mean, Mr Dickel (and other teachers) said a lot of things!

But, determined to prove him wrong, I figured the best thing to do was to get fit as that would really help my basketball. Up to that point, I would fake notes to get out of PE. But my friends were playing BB and I wanted to join them.

So, that one sentence, moment, could have defined me. Instead, it redirected me — towards a 35-year (and counting) love affair with running that’s brought me more joy, connection, and growth than I could have imagined at 13.

We often think words have power — and they do. But we decide the meaning they carry. 
We get to choose the story they tell.

Here’s to rewriting old narratives — and letting them fuel, not define, us. I think about that a lot as I work with people helping them unravel these long held beliefs that they feel define them, but truthfully just hold them back. Following a diet is easy, in comparison, as there are instructions, guides, rules as to what to do. This other work, though, is harder.
 Forever grateful to Mr. Dickel 🙏

11/09/2025

What you eat and when you eat it can have a profound impact on how anxious you feel.

If you’re anxious and have never really tried increasing your protein, that’s your first move. Those amino acids support your brain neurotransmitters, helping bring down your excitatory glutamate and enhance your GABA. It will also help support your blood sugar and help you avoid the peaks and troughs which send alarm 🚨 bells ringing and worsen anxiety.

But it can’t be just about yoghurt bowls and protein powder. Animal protein sources also contain a bunch of constituents, vitamins, minerals that also support the brain and neurotransmitter production (creatine, choline, cholesterol, iron, zinc, B12…). Clinically speaking, when I see a woman (who eats meat) goes from using protein powder/yoghurt to actually eating whole food protein sources like meat it makes a huge difference to their overall sense of calm.

If you’re eating a high protein diet (and particularly if lean) then you might need to bump calories, particularly from fat - but don’t forget carbohydrate either. Anxiety can be worsened when you under-eat, placing more stress on your already-stressed nervous system. When eating carbs, you want them accompanied by fat and protein to (again) balance blood sugar and support the brain.

Dietary fat supports the nervous system by building flexible cell membranes, regulating inflammation, stabilising neurotransmitter signalling, and steadying stress and blood sugar responses. Total win.

And… having some carbohydrate at night can calm the nervous system by boosting serotonin and melatonin production, lowering stress hormones like cortisol, and supporting steady blood sugar through the night. This helps the body shift into “rest-and-digest” mode, reducing anxiety and promoting better sleep. Again, paired with protein/fat to help slow release into bloodstream and I always prefer potato, kumara/sweet potato, rice, quinoa if you tolerate these over more refined processed options. You may need to lower protein at night if you struggle to sleep properly.

Mikki Williden, PhD

30/09/2025

28/09/2025

19/09/2025

19/09/2025

18/09/2025

16/09/2025

14/09/2025

13/09/2025

13/09/2025

11/09/2025

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