Why Your Body Is Blocking the Change You Want

There is a kind of stuckness that has nothing to do with ignorance or lack of effort.

It is the stuckness of knowing exactly what would help, and still not being able to do it.

You know you would feel better if you went to bed earlier.
You know eating properly would stabilise your energy.
You know moving your body consistently would help with the stiffness, the weight, the general sense of heaviness you carry.

And yet, night after night, you stay up later than you intend.
You snack in ways that do not really satisfy.
Exercise feels like something you should want, but cannot quite face.

The most common conclusion is also the most damaging.
That the problem must be you.

We are taught, quietly and repeatedly, that change is a matter of discipline. That if we wanted something badly enough, we would simply do it. Habits first. Feeling better later.

For many women, particularly as they move through their late thirties and forties, this logic begins to fall apart.

Because effort is expensive when energy is low.
Because motivation does not thrive in pain.
Because a tired nervous system will always choose relief over improvement.

In those conditions, “trying harder” is not a strategy. It is a stressor.

What often looks like self-sabotage is, in fact, self-preservation.

Late nights are rarely about poor boundaries. They are about evenings being the only time the body feels unobserved, unneeded, briefly at rest.

Snacking is not a moral failure. It is a physiological request for quick energy, certainty, comfort.

Avoiding movement is not laziness. It is often inflammation, joint pain, or the quiet fear that exercise will leave you worse rather than better.

When behaviour is framed as a symptom rather than a flaw, a different conversation becomes possible.

I see this pattern in my own life too. I know, unequivocally, that when I wake at a consistent time and protect my sleep routine, I feel better. Clearer. More grounded. More resilient.

This is not theoretical knowledge. It is lived experience.

And yet, when life is demanding, when my energy is stretched thin, those routines are the first thing to fray. Not because I do not care, but because my body resists structure when it feels depleted. What helps is not discipline, but support. When my energy improves, routine stops feeling like restraint and starts feeling like relief.

This is why small changes matter more than grand intentions.

Bodies do not respond well to being shocked into transformation. They respond to safety. To signals that resources are available again.

A small improvement in sleep quality can soften cravings.
A small reduction in inflammation can make movement feel possible.
A small increase in energy can restore a sense of agency that has been missing for years.

Momentum, when it comes, rarely arrives through force. It arrives through capacity.

Many women believe they are failing because they have not yet found the right plan. More often, they are failing because they are starting in the wrong place.

They are trying to build habits on top of exhaustion.
They are asking willpower to compensate for depletion.
They are treating outcomes as causes.

When the body is supported first, behaviour begins to shift, not perfectly, not instantly, but naturally.

And perhaps the most important shift of all is this.

You are not blocked because you are incapable.
You are blocked because your system is overwhelmed.

When that changes, even slightly, the change you have been chasing often follows quietly behind.

Not because you finally tried hard enough.
But because your body finally had the capacity to say yes.

If this resonated, I would love to invite you to my upcoming masterclass, Fix Your Hormones & Metabolism To Release Stubborn Weight After 40.

Register for free, here.