When it comes to the fitness industry it all seems to be lead by how we all want to look. Which is fine to a certain degree, we all want to be happy with how our bodies. But when it comes to postpartum fitness is that really the best driver towards working out?

When a mama gets to the 6 week mark and wants to get back into exercising what do you think her motives are? Well I can tell you the number one complaint I hear is that they want to lose the baby weight. OK great, but after digging a little deeper I find out they leak urine when they cough, their backs ache when they carry the car seat from A to B and they are drinking copious amounts of coffee to get them through the day. At what point should beauty and weight loss trump pain reduction, embarrassment and energy?

Scrolling through Instagram I see these women flashing their abs in skimpy outfits and challenging others to exercises that are beyond the ability of the majority of women. It saddens me that mamas scroll through these pages aspiring to be like these women when realistically it probably won’t happen. Lets see more women showing a happy healthy lifestyle with the littles!

Now I’m not saying that weight loss shouldn't be a goal, that can definitely be part of the program. Maybe the the fist goal should be LOVING your body regardless of what it looks like. Love the stretch marks because they wouldn't be there if you didn't have a baby. Love the flattened breasts because those boobs fed your baby. Then, what should come next is re-training the core and functional training.

But what does this mean?

Pelvic Floor Re-training. This doesn't only mean kegals, It includes releasing tight muscles, strengthening weak muscles and incorporating the ‘core four’ muscles in breathing. The foundation of a great training program MUST include these fundamentals. In order to understand your needs it is very helpful to visit a pelvic floor physiotherapist, who will be able to determine the health of your floor.
Postural Adjustments. Now I don’t mean going to the chiropractor, however this is always helpful. The way a personal trainer will tackle this is balancing the correct exercises vs stretches to re-align your posture.
Functional Movements - How should your body move is top of the list with my clients. What do you struggle with during the day? Do you struggle getting up and down from the floor? Do you get back pain when lifting your baby’s car seat? These kind of questions will help determine the movements I include in a program. Some of my favourite functional movements are kneeling to squat, single leg deadlift with a row or lunge with a toe tap. All these movements can translate to real life actions.

Try changing your perspective and see how that effects your results. Focus on the issues in hand instead of comparing yourself to others. Love yourself and your journey!!

Happy Healthy Workouts Mamas

I was sitting listening to a webinar on body image and it made me reflect on my past and how I use to treat my body. I have come a long way since my insecure years in high school/university. But what changed?

I have struggled with weight my whole life, I have always been small and on the low end of healthy….entering into unhealthy. I have been blessed with a fast metabolism but this does not mean I was happy. Every woman struggles with their body…prodding, poking and criticizing every second they get. Why can't I look like that supermodel, this is what I really want to look like. But is it really? Why do you want to look that way? Will it give you happiness? Will it make people love you more?

So what right do I have to tell you it isn't all about weight loss if I have never been over weight!

What I’m really trying to tell you is that mindset is the key to happiness. As soon as I shifted my mindset to loving my body for what it is I began to feel happy, content and even satisfied with who I am. I think I put too much energy into how I looked so I could have friends, love and achieve more. But my body wasn't the issue (even though I though it was for many years). It was all in my head, it was all about how I saw at myself.

Change your mindset, change your life.

So you just had a baby and you're thinking RIGHT, now its time to get my post baby body back. Well don’t waste the first weeks focusing on how to get your body back, you may never have the same body but that is OK! Life shouldn't revolve around losing weight if it’s just about getting smaller, that was a tough lesson I had to learn. No matter how small I got…nothing changed. I was still insecure, I still hated my body, I still struggled with liking myself. So why do you REALLY want to get smaller??

Lets shift the focus to why you should eat healthy and workout. Have a real conversation with yourself about what your motivation is, but try to stay away from visual body goals.

You want more energy
You want to be able to run after your toddler without feeling out of breath
You want to glow from the inside out
You want to prevent diseases that run in the family.
You want to show a good example for your children.
You want to FEEL GREAT!!

You created a life from NOTHING….thats amazing! Your body is capable of doing amazing things, you have to start loving it for what it can do. If you start to listen to your body and feed it what it really needs (both exercise and food) the weight loss will be a side effect. Mindfulness, moderation (although that word sucks lol) intuition, treat your body right. But eat that cookie too, its ok. Eat food because it nourishes the body, exercise because it gives you strength.

Have an even keel approach not a quick one time fix, slow and steady really does win the race.

Learning to look at yourself differently can be hard, but take small steps to make positive changes both physically and mentally. If it means unfollowing all the #fitmoms with their midriffs showing DO IT! Whatever makes you feel good about yourself. You are perfect, you grew a human from scratch!!

Happy workouts mamas!