Let's Be Healthy Latinas!

102. New Years Wellness Trends - Beware!

• Naihomy Jerez • Episode 102

Share episode

Send Naihomy encouraging words!💕

We challenge the new-year wellness noise and show how to build habits that last beyond the honeymoon phase. From protein hype to GLP‑1 marketing, we unpack the trends and lay out a slower, steadier path that fits real life.

• recognising how ads target insecurities and urgency
• food politics shaping labels, menus and defaults
• protein, fiber and microbiome claims across products
• GLP‑1 promotion and limits of quick fixes
• mass marketing versus individual needs and context
• planning for the season you’re in
• six-month consistency over 30-day challenges
• simple, repeatable habits for energy and strength
• using supplements as tools, not solutions

Shoot me an email at hola@naihomyjerez.com
Send me a DM on Instagram or book a consultation call with the link in the show notes


Thank you so much for listening!


SPEAKER_00:

Hello, friends. Welcome back to the podcast. It has been quite some time. We're in the beginning of a brand spank and new calendar year 2026. And today I want to talk to you about the infamous wellness trends that pop up in the beginning of a new year. New year, new you. And if you don't know, I worked in digital advertising for about 12 years before I became a certified integrative nutrition coach. And if you don't know, a lot of my close friends already do know, I am looking to transition back into a traditional role while I navigate my coaching business. So if you didn't know, now you know. And if you have connections, hit your girl up. However, that is not what we're gonna talk about today. I really want to talk about these trends because they really, really do affect us. It is pretty much unavoidable. And if we're not, I guess, careful or discerning or really aware of what we want in our health and wellness, it can just be a slippery slope. Okay. Before we get into that, I'll just share a little bit about why I've been away for a few weeks, especially at the end of the year in December. It's as it is for many of us, it was a busy time. I really felt like I was in deep burnout. And with 2025, it was nice and slow. There was nothing dramatic happening, right? However, there were a lot of things happening for me, a lot of ways in which I had to show up in multiple lanes of my life. And I did not realize how badly it had crept up on me. So I really had to take a break from a lot of things to just gather myself, and there was many things also going on in my personal life that I just had to give space to. So I was honoring that for myself. My one of my sons also ended up getting the flu, and then I got the flu, and then it was the holidays, and just so much happening. So I took a lot of time to just rest. I slept in a lot, I worked on puzzles while I had the flu. I binge watched TV, which I never ever ever do. We ate out a lot or got food outside because cooking is definitely a job. I connected with friends personally, and I took a lot of breaks from social media, from the podcast, from emails, a lot of things. I showed up for my clients, and I just really focused on nurturing and serving myself. And with that said, let's get into these trends. And by the way, I hope you had a nice holiday season. I hope you're having a nice start to the new year. And I hope that in this episode, it just helps you reflect. If you're here, you're probably here because you really are interested in health and wellness from a cultural perspective, from somebody who is a mom to two kids, who has long commutes, who lives in a big city. Um from New York City, if you're new here, um, who has a partner, who has a home, and it can be very overwhelming to also think about ways to take care of ourselves. And we know that we need to and we actually want to. However, it can be, like I said, very overwhelming to try and figure that out. And Q1 or the beginning of the new year is a prime time for the multi-billion dollar wellness industry to kind of prey on the people, on us and on our wellness, and to try and give us a quick solution to issues with our health and our wellness, or our appearance that we've been trying to solve for for a really long time that are actually really affecting our health, or that we just don't like about ourselves and we want to improve, and all of that is fine. What I find is that and I don't want to say, you know, I I was saying a lot like don't pay attention, don't do this, but that's not effective. And it's not effective because uh during this time the ads are everywhere, it's really hard to avoid, it's always in your face, is on TV ads, is on the subway ads, it's on social media, it's on like it's in your email, it is everywhere. And whether they're targeting you or not, whether your search or something or not is just so pervasive and it's so in your face that uh you or we when I say you, I'm not I don't mean you specifically. I mean like us as a society really start to question if we need that, if that is the solution, if that is the solution to lose weight, if that is the solution to improve your wrinkles or your hair, your nails, or uh the way you look in your clothes, your energy, that's a huge one, your energy. And we believe them, right? Like we believe the wellness industry when they tell us that this one thing is going to be the solution. And let's not even let's not even fully dig into uh the politics of health and wellness, right? This week the uh good old um RFK just announced a rebrand of the food pyramid, which was not a pyramid before, and I'm not really gonna get into that. However, it affects a lot of things, it affects policies, it affects how lunches are served in schools and probably in hospitals, and you know how decisions are made, a lot less on an individual level, right? But more on a societal level. So that comes into play too. And something that you thought that you were doing right now all of a sudden is wrong, and we're getting all these mixed messages. The truth is, just very quickly, that food has always been political, especially when it became so commercialized and capitalized, and it moved into big uh corporations instead of small farms, small local farms, access to a lot of whole foods, not the supermarket, just like actual food that just comes from earth, has limited access, right? Is expensive and a lot of the food, quote unquote, that's around is highly processed, is addictive from these companies because they're for-profit companies. And a lot of times when let's say these mass commercial farms want to sell something, want to promote something, they have too much of a certain crop or whatever it is, they will go ahead and promote specific types of foods or create new products so that they don't lose out on that money. And I'll tell you what, this is all from things I read and what I know about the industry. I encourage you to look this up as well, um so that you are also well informed, right? It's not something that I'm just making up. I encourage you to look at to look these up, to look at the practices. There's also a ton of documentaries on Netflix and stuff like that about food, right? And about how food is marketed as well. Now, what triggered all of this for me is that the other day I was walking to pick up my kids from school, and I walked by a Dunkin Donuts, and all of a sudden there's like a sticker on the window, like a marketing sticker that just says protein, protein, protein, protein, like five times in a row. And I'm like, seriously, seriously, what what kind of protein is Dunkin' Donuts selling, right? What what are they adding to their drinks now? Are you gonna go and get a drink that has maybe 10 grams of protein because it has whole milk in it and like 43 grams of sugar? And on the other window, they had a sticker that said like protein latte. What pisses me off is that a lot of times these companies are selling you the same exact product, it's the same latte, and they're just pulling out different key words, trendy words, gimmicky words that are part of the wellness industry at the moment to support their sales and to attract your attention. Because the truth is that we are herd mentality type of human animals, and if you see that something's trending, or they're telling you that that's the next best thing for you to lose weight and to maintain your muscle mass and all this, then all of a sudden you're gonna be attracted to something like protein being promoted on a Dunkin' Donuts window, and be like, Oh, I'm going to get some of my grams of protein from here, not necessarily knowing that it might not be in your best interest if you're having a cup of whatever drink you get with about 10 grams of protein. I didn't even look this up because a lot of the times I do, but just knowing the amount of protein and something like dairy, or maybe they're putting some sort of protein powder, or I saw something wild from I think it was Starbucks to get protein foam. Like, what the fuck is protein foam? What is that? What is that? Okay, and it's just and then mind you, it has like a ridiculous amount of sugar inside because that I've definitely looked up from Dunkin' Donuts, how much sugar are actually in these drinks, and you're like, oh, I'm getting my protein in, but not realizing that you're having four to five times the amount of sugar in a liquid beverage, and who the fuck cares how much protein is in there anymore, right? When when your body's like drowning in how much sugar it has to process because you're not even using up that much energy, you're probably just going to go have a seat somewhere. So that's the kind of stuff, like that's the thought process that my brain goes through when I see these things. And other things I've seen is like Weight Watchers ads all over the train, right? The subway. And all Weight Watchers is promoting now is GLP ones. The Costco email, the wellness Costco email. I open up, they talk about getting your eyes checked, and they talk about the different supplements that you can get, and they talk about their pharmacy and guess what's also in the email. How you can now get GLP ones for$200 a month. You want to pay$200 a month for something that's effective for the long term. Let's talk, friends. Let's talk. Um, but there's been so much trends and gimmicks that people don't actually understand how they work, and they think that just by doing one thing or getting this one supplement, their whole life is gonna change. And I'll name a few in the food world. It's been fiber, fiber is very popular now, too. Microbiome, like help your gut health. Not only has microbiome has been super famous when it comes to food, but also for skin care, everything is like the microbiome of your face, help your microbiome, protein, which we're currently in, fat-free, which was something very pervasive. A few years back, where everything was fat-free, fat-free, don't eat fat because it makes you fat, which can be further from the truth. And a lot of women had too little fat, which was actually affecting their hormone health. Now, in the new guidelines, is like, oh, have full fat. Like, you know what I mean? Gluten-free is another one. Gluten-free is so important, so important for people who actually need to be gluten-free. And a lot of people confuse gluten-free with carb-free, but that's it, was as much of it as it is a factual medical necessity for a lot of humans who cannot digest gluten, it was equally a trend. Also, plant-based or vegan, like, let's do that, let's do carnivore, let's do intermittent fasting, let's do, and everything gets tailored to that. Another ad I saw was Chipotle, the get protein bowl. What are they doing? Putting two scoops of chicken in your bowl. You know what I mean? Like, if you understood food, you already knew how to make a protein heavy or protein adequate for whatever your needs are, bowl at Chipotle. But now it's become part of their mass marketing where they have this as menu options. So you're still letting, and you don't even know if that's what you need, right? Because it's to the masses, not to the individual, and everybody's health is individual. So we're still you're still letting outside companies whose main interest is profit, whose main interest, I'm gonna repeat it, whose main interest is profit instead of your actual health. They, every single company will jump on whatever wellness trend is happening and gimmick is happening at the moment so that they can keep sales happening, they can keep profits up because it's a fucking business. Right, if if you're a business, you need revenue, you need profits, you need you know money to keep running, however, it's such such a gray zone when you are also affecting the health and wellness of another human being. Now, this is why I want to share this because I want to encourage you to be curious, I want to encourage you as to how to be discerning and how to really understand for yourself if this is something that you want, if this is something that you need, if how is this going to be part of the bigger picture or the plan, what are your actual goals? Because then you can really make a decision for yourself instead of being like, Oh, this is the new fiber supplement, and this is the new green powder, and this is the new, oh my gosh, this bar has protein in it, and this is all you're seeing. All the cereal boxes now have protein slapped on it, right? Or fiber. Um, before it was cholesterol, right? Like it's so good for your heart health. And I want you to see, I want you to start to be curious enough to see past this bullshit layer and understand and really be able to look at a supplement. And trust me, I have a bunch of supplements, however, I want you to understand why you're using it, what's the purpose of it, and if it works for you. Not because fulaniti berence is the best thing or that is working for them. I mean, that's great if it's working for them. Um, but again, everybody's an individual, so it might not work for you. There's so many things that need to be taken into consideration. And what I want to I guess encourage you is not to all of a sudden jump on a bandwagon because it's in your face all the time. It's taking a step back and actually analyzing to see if this is something that's gonna work because you're gonna spend all this money on all these things, and then you're gonna be back at square one because a lot of these things are so short-lived. And to off the bat, just one product alone is not going to be your saving race, it can be supportive of a larger goal or of a larger strategy in your health journey, however, it's not gonna be the solution, a lot of times it's a combination of things that you need to be doing so that it can be effective. That's one. Number two is it needs to be done over a period of time, and I don't mean like oh, 30, 30 days, 30 day challenge, 60 days, just for you know, I don't know, whatever time frame, or it just slowly fades out because you have not realized how to actually implement it into your lifestyle, and then life gets busy again. Life gets so busy, the honeymoon period ends, the excitement fades away, the honeymoon. Moon period ends, and then you're left with you and your thoughts, you and your busy, stressed-out life, and everything you try to implement just kind of falls on the wayside by the wayside until January 2027 when we're gonna start the cycle all over again. And what I want to offer you is that there's a difference between actually wanting a lifestyle change and wanting these health and wellness habits to stick and wanting to do it for the rest of your life, because that's literally the timeline, like until you pass away, because there's always something that you can do instead of just hopping hopping on trends and gimmicks and having them fall through the wayside again and it impacting your self-confidence because then it turns into nothing works for me. I've tried everything, nothing works, I'm broken, it's not worth it, I'm not even giving it a try. It just is what it is, it's because I'm getting older, and I just want to reassure you that none of that is actually true. It's probably that you haven't tried it for long enough, and by long enough, I mean at least six months of consistency, girlfriend. At least six months, or it just has not been the right strategy for you. There's so many people that jump on trends like intermittent fasting or turning vegan or carnivore or like cutting out whole food groups or over-exercising, like or or like these supplements, and they don't see results, or they're getting worse and they don't understand why, or you're overcompensating, like you are not eating very balanced, and you're tired and you need more energy, so then you go ahead and fill up on sugar and coffee, and you don't even notice that you're snacking, and this is how you're fulfilling your energy, or your sleep is being disturbed, and that causes more cravings throughout the day. Like, you know what I mean? Everything is a spiral, and the spiral can either work in your favor or work against you because wellness is all tied together, is not just that one thing. So I want you to really be clear with yourself if you are following trends and gimmicks, and by the beginning of March, you're over it because the honeymoon period is over, and you just don't understand or know, which is totally fair, how to keep the momentum going, how to keep the consistency going because you're not motivated because you're tired of all of this, right? Or if you're really actually willing to create this lifestyle change and you are okay figuring it out, you are okay not being perfect as long as you figure out a way to create some consistency. You really want to dig deeper than just the honeymoon period and the excitement and see what changes you need to make in your mindset, how you can get creative, how you can work with different options instead of being like super militant about wellness looking one way, and how you can explore different ways to incorporate things into your life and into this specific season because that's another thing. Depending on the season of your life that you're in, wellness can look very different, and you might need different strategies. It doesn't mean that you you there's no space for it at all. All right, so be mindful during this season as to how many things are in your face. Okay, I want you to notice that and be like, shit, damn, it is everywhere. I want you to play the well where's Waldo game with how many times you can spot a brand that never in their fucking life has spoken about their protein or their fiber or whatever else, or now all of a sudden they're doing GLP1s instead of counting points or calories or whatever the fuck, and actually, and and and how they're changing the story that they're selling you, selling you, and trying to tell you about yourself and how they're doing that. I want you to be aware of that, all right, instead of just jumping on whatever whatever the companies or whoever is trying to sell you. Because I'll tell you the truth, if you're really in it for a lifestyle change in the long haul, it's actually really fucking boring, and anybody who's in this lifestyle and he's committed to it will actually tell you that it is not sexy, it is boring as hell, it is repetitive, however, it pays off big. It pays off big, and you do, I'm not saying it's forever like that. You do find joys, you do find pleasure, you do find excitement and all that, but to think that is always going to be that way, and you're always going to be in this honeymoon phase is really, really, really unrealistic. That's all I gotta say. So pay attention to everything that you're getting and really make a decision for yourself as to how you want to approach your health and wellness, and if you just want to be part of the club and have these conversations and try the trendy things and be okay with whatever results you get or you don't get and what happens after that, or if you really want to make a lifestyle change and come be part of the boring crew, the boring wellness crew, and really try to figure this shit out on a deeper level, even if you do use your favorite supplement, right? On a deeper level so that it actually sticks and you're actually able to navigate it across all facets of life, whether you're stressed, whether you're at work, whether you're on vacation or whatever it is, that's exactly what my clients do. That's exactly what I do. And how you can keep this up for the long term to be able to get the results that you are looking for. More energy, looking better in your clothes, feeling better in your clothes, feeling amazing in your own skin, losing that weight in a way that's healthy and you're protecting your muscle mass, right? You doing things that will not just benefit you now, but will benefit you as you get older so that you can remain strong and independent and autonomous, and you're able to do the things that you want to do without your body stopping you because you're in pain or you've lost your mobility or whatever that is. So I'll leave you with that. If you want support on the boring ass stuff, that's where I got you. I'm not here to trick you, I'm not here to sell you a fantasy, I'm not here to do none of that. I'm here to really be your biggest cheerleader when it comes to developing your health and wellness lifestyle, to developing your education, to learning about yourself and how to keep this up for the long haul. That's what I'm here for. So go ahead and get in contact with me. Shoot me an email at ola at naomiderez.com is in the show notes. Send me a DM on Instagram or book a consultation call with the link in the show notes. All right, I hope you have a beautiful week. I'll see y'all next time. Bye.