Hello, everyone. This is your host, Susan Rosin. Today, my guest is Olivier Mocando. I think I got that right. He is in the UK. I'm going to let Olivier introduce himself. Welcome. Okay, thank you for every meet on this podcast. I'm really, really grateful for that. My name is Olivier. I'm a speaker, author, weight loss and wellness coach. In 2016, I changed my lifestyle, and I was able to go through some profound changes that completely changed my health and the course of my life.
That's why I decided to share what I've learned. I do that through my talks, my book, my coaching program, so that people can live their lives without being sick. Basically, that's what I do in a nutshell. Oh, okay. I know there's a story behind that. How did you end up getting to that point where you said, Okay, I got to change my life? Like I was saying, I'm originally from the Democratic Republic of Congo. I grew up in Africa.
Over there, basically, when I grew up, we didn't have any computer games and stuff like that. We were attached to play outside Running around, playing football, climbing trees and stuff like that. That's why we were really all the time in movement and stuff. At that time as well, I was not exposed to too much processed food, too much animal product, dairy product and stuff like that. When I was growing up, I was very lean.
It's only when I left Congo, I first went to South Africa, and then I came to the UK. Then that's how all my problem started because here I was really exposed to a lot of animal products. Every meal I could have, maybe in the morning, I would have some bacon, some salami. At noon, I would have some chicken, at night I would have some fish, so I had everything. Basically, I was eating lots of processed food and all this thing, and that's why my health started to get very bad.
That's basically how everything started for me to get on this journey. How long were you doing that before you realized, Hey, this is not working for me? It took a very long time because I arrived in the UK in the year 2000. It's only in 2016 that I changed. What happened is that before that, my health, like I was saying, starting to get very bad. I had lots of bad eating habit. So for example, at midnight, I would have my bottle of Coca-Cola with some
biscuits, some cakes, and stuff like that. Oh, my God. Yeah, I used to be tired all the time. For example, on the days when I had to go to work, I was tracking myself out of bed. And on the days off, my days off, I would sleep until 1:00 PM because I was so tired. And I even remember the last place where I was working, because I was working in the lab, and the lab was in the basement, and I had to climb the stairs all the time, and I was always out of breath.
I was suffering because of all that my bad eating habit, eating lots of animal product, dairy product, and lots of processed food. I was suffering from high blood pressure, and the doctor told me that I'll be on medication for the rest of my life. People should know that high blood pressure is very dangerous. 50% of people who suffer from heart attacks and strokes, it's because of the blood pressure. I was suffering as well from massive headaches every day or every other day.
I even remember that I have some painkillers in my wallet all the time. Dentrophs, chest pain, back pain, abscesses, joint pain, and a lot of dental problems. Every 2-3 months, I see my dentist. Basically, what's happened is that in 2016, I was just watching a program on YouTube, and there was an Indian yogi who suggested that by stopping eating animal product, it was possible to reverse 70% of the chronic diseases.
Because my health was pretty bad, I said, Okay, I'm going to try that because I really trusted the guy. It was a sudden Wednesday that I watched the program. On Thursday, I came back from work. I had my last meal of meat, and on Friday, I went cold turkey. The week after, it was very, very difficult because I had a lot of detox symptoms. Basically, what's happened is that my symptoms got worse. I started to have more colds or more headaches.
My joint started to ache even more, so it was horrendous. My family even asked me to stop, but I said, No, I'm going to continue. Then after a week, all the symptoms disappeared completely, and I'm starting to have lots of energy, lots of mental clarity, and everything's starting to get better and better. Four months into my transformation, I went to see my doctor who told me that I'll be on medication for the for the best of my life, and everything was gone.
I didn't have any high blood pressure anymore. All my chronic diseases went away. Basically, at that time, when I started the transformation, my weight was 220 After nine months, I was able to lose 77 pounds. Because I made the change in 2016, and for the past eight years, I've not been sick a single day. For nine years, I've not taken a single pill. That's how I got into this transformation. I bet your family is very happy about it, too. Yeah, definitely. They're all happy.
What's happened is that even here at home, all of us, we were able to change our eating habits. For example, my wife, she lost 99 pounds. She went changing their way of eating. All my kids as well were able to change their lifestyle as well. All of us, we are planned based now. Even one of my sons, he was suffering from eczema, so he For 11 years. We saw doctors, they prescribed all sorts of creams, but there were no changes.
But when we adopted this plant-based nutrition, it only took two weeks for his entire eczema to disappear completely. All of us, we were able to get some positive change from that. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, wow. I'll have to read your book. I'm afraid I still eat Not a lot, but I do eat a lot of... Not necessarily... Well, I guess it's meat. I'm allergic to things from a cow.
Other things that I do, other meat, those sources, it's mostly like chicken, which isn't quite as bad, but still isn't at the level that you guys are I mean. Wow, that's pretty amazing. It doesn't surprise me. I'm not sure if that's the right way to put it. In other words, especially if you're drinking Coca at midnight, I mean, I can't. But see, I'm not a Coca-Cola person. I've never liked the taste of it. I was lucky that way, huh? Although I fat for a while when I was younger.
Do you work with people now? I mean, is that other than your book and you said you were doing coaching, right? Yeah. Do you work with people from all over the world? Because with Zoom, I mean, for goodness' sake, you can whichever way you want to do it, right? Tell us a little bit more about your practice and maybe about some of your clients.
What happened is that because I went through these profound changes, I was really eager to really share that knowledge because basically, we've been told that when we grow up, we need to be sick and all these things. When I started this transformation, I was 46. Today, I'm 54. Basically, my health is getting better and better. I just wanted to show people that when you grow up, when you get older, you don't necessarily have to be sick. That's why I wanted to share that with people.
That's why I wrote my book and I'm starting to speak because I'm a speaker, starting to speak at conferences and stuff like that. That's why people are starting to ask me what was that doing? And stuff like that. And that's when I said, Okay, I'm going not to help people on a one-on-one basis. What's happened is that I've got a coaching program, which is a 16-week one-on-one coaching program. My primary client are women over 30. Oh, interesting.
Basically, what's happened is that when they want to enroll in my program, first of all, they have to book a free weight loss and wellness discovery call with me. On the discovery call, what we do, we explore their diet, we explore their current situation, their health issues, everything that's bothering them, and we discover what they stock and stuff like that. If there's a good fit, then we work together so that they can resolve all these problems that have been troubling them for a long time.
Because primarily, when we go through this, I try to help them lose weight. But what is more important is to be in good health because there's a lot of people who are slim, but they are not in good health. For example, I remember even my uncle, he died two years ago He was very slim, but he died of diabetes. People think that when they are slim, it means that they're in good health, but that's not really true. You can be slim and really in bad shape. That's what I'm doing in my coaching program.
I think that's great. Why do you think that men don't get quite as interested in getting healthy as women seem to? Do you have a theory on that? Yeah, I would think that men, they like to be a little bit macho, like strong, and basically going to search for an answer, something. It's like it's luring them. It's like they are not mainly anymore, and that's why they do that.
When we look as well as women, when we look in magazine and stuff like that, there's lots of magazine for women, and they always speak about them being slim, about their figures and stuff like that. And that's why there's more pressure on women to change and to become slim and stuff like that. And that's why I would imagine that that's the reason why I get mostly women in my program.
Okay. Interesting. Yeah, because I would think when you look at it from a health point of view, that men should be just as interested in getting healthy as women. But I can see where... Although a lot of men have become much more body-aware, I guess maybe, as a way of putting it, where they want to be slim, they want to be, I don't know, they'll go work out or do that stuff. But I'm not sure that they're quite as interested because usually when you're in a family or you're...
Men don't get into cooking and food and all of that as much as women do. That might be another issue is that men think there's got to be other ways of getting healthy. Yeah. As well, for example, for me, because I come from Africa, and usually, for example, in my country, over there, basically for people when they are overweight, it's never been a problem. Basically, being overweight, it's like a status. It means that you've got money and stuff like that.
That's why even when I was in the UK, being fat never bothered me. It was just all the ailment that I was going through, the high blood pressure, the pain in my body, the headaches and stuff. That's what was really disturbing me. But my weight has never been a problem for me. It depends as well which culture you're coming from as well. Yeah, no, that makes sense. That makes sense, yeah. I think even here or in the UK, I think there's some of that as well. There isn't the same.
I mean, even if you look at commercials on the television, Most of them are these beautiful women, and the men... It is interesting, Yeah. A lot of pressure on women. Yeah, absolutely. I understand that myself just from my own personal experience, because I was a fat kid, and I was fat until I was, I don't know, my early 20s, I guess, somewhere in there, late teens, early 20s.
I had a doctor that I was going to, and she It was interesting because she said to me, she said, Well, you either lose the weight now or you're going to be fighting it the rest of your life. I was like, Okay, what do I have to do? Because I had done all the weight, all the diets and all that stuff, right? Yeah. So that was when I lost the weight, and I've never, knock on wood, never put it back wherever some wood is. No wood. Oh, there we go. It's interesting.
That's one of the things I love doing with this podcast is that everybody's got their own story, and they're all a little different. I'm sure you probably see that in the people that you work with, that all of them are a little different. Yeah. It's always different. You can have, for example, some of my clients, they are very eager to really want to change everything about them. They follow all the courses, all the material. They are really on time when you have a Zoom call and stuff like that.
But others, they're a little bit lazy. They don't really want. You have to push them and stuff like that. It's really different from people. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, funny that way. How many people that you've worked with or met through this are from families where all of people are overweight or most of them. There's just this one person who wants to better their life and get in better health. Mostly, the client that have been able to help, that's the common denominator.
Most of them are coming from a family where a lot of people are overweight and they are the only one who are trying to change the situation. What is more difficult for them is that when they are trying to make all these changes, when, for example, they go and visit their friends and family, for example, they have to They start questioning them. They start asking them why are they doing this and that?
Especially because in my program, I go on a plant-based nutrition where I try to ask people to stop or considerably reduce the animal the dairy product, and the processed food. This is very uncommon for most people, and that's why they start questioning them. Sometimes it's very difficult for them to keep up with that. Because usually, when you see someone making a progress in the right direction, a lot of people want to track them down.
That's a little bit the difficulty that some of my clients I can't have. Oh, yeah. No, I'm sure. I'm sure. I would assume that you warn them about that when you get started, right? Yeah, exactly. That's why I told them that when you start the program, I usually tell them not to start discussing what they're doing with people because they will get discouraged. It's better for them to do what I'm telling them.
When people will see that they're starting to lose where their health are starting to get better, then they can tell them what they're doing, but not before. Right. No, that makes a lot of sense. Definitely. Yeah. Interesting. Interesting. Yeah. Boy, people are sure strange, aren't they?
Okay. Yeah. I was going to say, you had told me anyways, and We talked a little bit about it, but I'm just curious how you really... I know you did this in trying to get yourself better, not thinking of it as, Oh, this is going to be my new profession, right? Yeah. I don't know. I'm trying to think. Did it take a while? After you did it after you did For a week or less, you just all of a sudden felt so much better, and then it just kept getting better?
Can you tell me a little bit more about your journey through being where you were and to where you are now? Basically, what happened is that when I made the change, like I said, the first week was really horrendous. That's why a lot of people stopped doing that. Because they go through detox symptoms. Usually, that's how the body gets rid of toxins. It's going to make you sick. Most people will say, No, it's not working, and they will go back to what they've been doing in the past.
That's what people need to really to understand. For me, when I pass that one week, everything's starting to get better. As long as I continuing to do that, it was getting better and better. Like I've just said for the past eight years, I've not been sick a single day because every time, everything is getting better and better. For example, there's nothing that I cannot do now that I was able to do when I was 20. Still energetic. I can run, I can climb trees, I can do all these things.
It's getting better and better. That's why I keep telling to people that when they adopt this lifestyle, they don't... Even in my program, that's why I ask my client not to do like me to go cold turkey. I tell them to go step by step because if you go cold turkey, not for everybody, but for some people, they can have detox symptoms and it can be not good for them. Luckily for me, I had the drive. I was really focused. I had the determination. That's why I went through.
But normally, I ask people to go step by step and not to do all that at one go. So that they will not have those detox symptoms and the transition will be very smooth for them. Right. Yeah. And instead of the negative symptoms of getting rid of all the toxins, they They can start feeling better, which then makes them more confident and more willing to stay with the whole thing. No, it makes a lot of sense.
Because a lot of people, when they start out, because when you are used to eat lots of processed food, lots of animal products, dairy products, and all this stuff, and when you change appropriately, the body is going to react in a violent way because Because the body is saying, What's going on? What's going on here? Usually, if you don't, people will say, Oh, no, because I'm eating lots of fruit, lots of vegetables, and stuff like that, my body doesn't like that.
I need to go back and continue to eat all the processed food and all these things. Because most people, they don't know that's how the body gets rid of toxins. That's why when they start to feel that or they start having headaches and stuff like that, then they will just stop. But if you persist, all these things will disappear and you will get better. Just people are a little bit... They are not aware of all these things. Oh, no, absolutely. Absolutely.
Especially if they haven't done this before. Yeah. Right? Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Do you give them your book and say, Here, read this first? That's why it's good sometimes to have a coach because they've done the work before and they can guide you so that you know exactly what to do or not to be faced out. Absolutely. It's interesting.
For me, I ended up, besides the woman, the doctor who had helped me when I was younger, after another 10 years or something, I ended up developing a whole a bunch of allergies. And so there's a whole bunch of stuff that I can't eat anyways, which has helped, like wheat and anything from a cow. Can't tolerate anything from a cow. It's funny how your body tries to help you, and you look at it and go, Why the hell did I end up with all those things?
Because when you look, for example, at the every product, you will see that human beings are the only species in the entire creation who drink milk from another species. You will never see, for example, a cat drinking dog's milk or a goat drinking cow's milk because every milk is specific to its own species. For example, if you look at the rabbit milk, it contains 10 times more proteins, protein than the human milk because when the baby rabbit is born, it's very small.
You need to basically double its size within the first week if you want to sustain life. When you look, for example, at the seal's milk, it contains 40% fat because the baby seal need to build that fat very quickly because it's very cold in the North Pole. You look at the human's milk, it contains lots of lactal bemin because we need to produce amino acid. You look at the cow's milk, it contains lots of caesine. You can see that every milk is specific to his own species.
When we If you drink other species milk, it's not good. You will even see that, for example, you look at when we are born, you will see that there's a hormone which is called lactase, which enables people to digest milk. When we reach the age between two and four years old, that enzyme cease to be produced, which is suggestive that we need to stop drinking milk. That's why 70% of the world population is lactose-intolerant, just like you. It's because of that.
Interesting. Okay. Wow. It took a while for me to have that problem. I mean, I was in almost 20 years old. Yeah. But yeah, interesting. You see, and I still can't do anything from a cow, but... Excuse me. Goat milk doesn't seem to bother me, but then I drink it. I eat goat milk cheese, which probably has a lot of those things out of it, taken out of it when they produce it, right? Yeah. But interesting. It only makes sense that the milk would all be different.
The animals were all different, right? Exactly. Yeah. Interesting. Interesting. For example, if you take the human milk and you start feeding that to a calf, it's going to die because it's not going to have all this nutrient. When you look, for example, at the cow's milk, it's got loads and loads of growth hormones. Because when the baby calf is born, he weighs something like 30 kilos, and you need to triple that weight within three months. Oh, wow.
Later on in life, you will see a cow will weigh maybe 2,200 a pound. So they become very big. The milk needs to have lots and lots of growth hormone and lots of calcium. We are not designed to handle that. That's why when babies drink cow's milk, they become fat. Okay. Well, I'm sure I had some of that because my mother was not into breastfeeding. For any of us. I have four kids, and she never breastfed any of us. Yeah.
So interesting. Okay. No, it makes perfect sense if you sit down and think about it, right? And that's why, for example, even The way you think that you've got lots of allergies, and usually it's when you have lots of dairy products, milk and stuff like that, it creates lots and lots of allergies. Loads. Yeah, interesting. Like I said, I did. I was not a big milk drinker, really, growing up. It wasn't one of my favorite foods. But I put it in cereal or stuff like that.
But drinking a glass of milk? No. Never. Not something I liked. Yeah. I mean, even now, I drink. Actually, I don't drink I think. But if I use milk, it's always oak milk or something that's not a living being. That's a bit of. Yeah. So interesting. So I'll have you give me your... I'm having brain fog. How people can get in touch with you if they want to either get into one of your programs or buy a book or whatever.
And if you send me all of that information, I'll put that in the show notes so that anyone who's listening who wants to follow up will be able to do so. Yeah, definitely. I would like as well to give your listeners or your viewers a free gift, which is my seven tips to lose weight. That's the exact tips that I've used myself to lose 77 pound. I'll give you the link so they can download that for free. Okay, perfect.
As well, if they go on Amazon, they can get hold of my book, which is the Plant-Based Nutrition: How It's Going to change your life. If they buy that on my website, which is oliviermancom. Com, then they will be able to have that with four bonuses. That's how they can get hold of me.
Like I was saying before, if they are interested in my 16 weeks weight loss program, I'll give you the link so that they can book a free weight loss and wellness discovery call with me so we can see if there's a good fit. And if that's the case, then we can work together and help them who we can reclaim their health. Yeah. And it doesn't matter where they are either because- No, it doesn't matter because I do that online. It's online, so they can be anywhere in the world.
That's fine. Yeah. Yeah. No, exactly. I just wanted to make sure that everybody knew that. Well, these days it can be iffy, right? Some people do, some people don't. Anyway. Okay, well, that's good. You'll send me all of that information? Yes, I'll send you all the information. Okay, and I will put it in the show notes. With that, I'll say thank you very much. I really appreciate you coming on the program.
A lot of good information, which is always helpful for people because you had a lot of answers, I think, to questions, which I'm sure you're always prepared for. Yeah. Thank you very much for giving me the opportunity to be on your show, to share my message. I'm really, really grateful for that. Thank you. Okay. Well, thank you. I will say what I usually say, which is neither of us are doctors, and this is not to be seen as medical advice. I will be talking to everybody next week.