I Lost 84 Pounds — and the Cravings Finally Stopped
How Julie Gushlaw went from a size 20 to a size 4 by giving her body the minerals it was missing
If you’ve ever felt like your cravings were stronger than any willpower you could summon — like the harder you fought the pull toward sugar, carbs, and salty snacks, the louder it got — then you need to meet Julie Gushlaw.
For years, Julie’s story sat in the pages of a magazine and never made it here. I’m fixing that today.
When Julie began, she weighed 232 pounds. Like so many women over 45, she was caught in a cycle she couldn’t explain. She’d reach for something salty, then something sweet, and an hour later the hunger would come roaring back. She blamed her willpower. Most of us do.
But the problem was never willpower. The problem was minerals.
When your body runs low on sodium, potassium, and magnesium, it sends out signals that feel exactly like hunger — and it steers you toward the fastest fix it knows: salt, sugar, and refined carbs. Cardiovascular researcher Dr. James DiNicolantonio, author of The Salt Fix, has spent years making this case: when sodium drops, the brain ramps up salt-seeking and the whole reward system tilts toward food. And when magnesium runs low, blood sugar swings harder — setting off the crash-and-crave cycle that sends you looking for something sweet. The craving isn’t a character flaw. It’s a signal.
That was the missing piece for Julie. Once she understood it, everything changed.
She started giving her body back the minerals it had been missing with Zero Hunger Water — sodium, potassium, and magnesium, every couple of hours through her day. The cravings that had run her life began to quiet. She wasn’t white-knuckling her way through hunger anymore. She simply felt satisfied.
The weight came off — 84 pounds of it, over 11 months. Julie went from 232 pounds to 148, and from a size 20 to a size 4.
What moves me about Julie’s story isn’t only the number on the scale. It’s that she finally got an answer to the question that had haunted her for years: Why couldn’t I stop? She was never weak. Her body was asking for minerals — and the moment she gave it what it needed, the cravings lost their grip.
That’s the whole idea behind Zero Hunger Water. The hunger that hits during your eating window, and the cravings that ambush you in the afternoon, often aren’t hunger at all. They’re a mineral need in disguise. Give your body sodium, potassium, and magnesium, and you can get through your day satisfied — without the suffering, and without surrendering to sugar.
→ Read Julie’s full story (PDF)
