If I’m asking you about your Turning Point and to identify whether you’ve reached it, it makes sense for me to talk about mine.
Turning Point
My first Turning Point was when I couldn’t exercise from year 11 at school because my knees played up so I took to swimming, I was pretty useless at sport so it was a great excuse to do something that I was beginning to enjoy, and avoid feeling embarrassed by attempting to play tennis for the first time!
Once I hit 6th form, I was allowed to go to the school gym. They had cables, a rowing machine and a sit up bench from what I remember. I didn’t really know what I was doing so I used to hang out in there with other people who may have had more of an idea.
I then used to run as well.
Looking back, there was a lot of over-exercising but I used to think that the more you exercised, the healthier you were.
Although this was the start of a negative relationship with exercise, there was a positive in that I realised that exercising didn’t have to be in a team sport, but could be individual and what felt right.
My Main Turning Point
Although I became a PT over 3 years ago and made it a career 2 years ago, my most recent turning point and biggest was around a month before I got married.
I’d spent a good 12 months freaking out how I’d never look good enough on my wedding day and it was putting me off the idea of getting married. How I looked was stopping me from marrying the love of my life.
Utter madness!
Your Health is an Investment, Not an Expense
I enlisted the help of an online nutritionist for fat loss and it helped to have the accountability and I made so much progress, but at the same time, I couldn’t see the progress myself. Looking back it’s crazy but at the time all I could think was I’ll never be good enough.
I also invested in myself with a personal trainer at the studio I worked at. He was on hand to hear my concerns, worries and assure me everything would be okay. Yes it was for accountability, to fit in an extra session where I didn’t have to think about what I was doing, be told what to do and just enjoy it. It also helped me understand what it felt like to be a client as the last time I had a PT was when I was qualifying to know what it felt like and understand it more.
PT became about time for me, to do what makes me feel good and to literally workout my problematic thoughts as weddings are incredibly stressful. These sessions used to leave me feeling energised and with a smile on my face. It was a physical and mental relief.
My Fuck It Moment
A month before the wedding, I had my “fuck it moment”. I was tired of trying to get to this fairytale vision of who I thought I should be. I decided it was time to just enjoy the final lead up to the wedding and focus on being me as after all, that was who Charlie was marrying and who everyone was turning up to see.
Through working with a PT and nutritionist, it instilled in me that fuelling my body correctly helps a ton, that weight is dependent on stress, too much exercise, time of the month and then about a million other factors. At the end of the day you need to live a life you enjoy, but try and live a healthy one at the same time because you’ve only got one body so you need to take care of it every step of the way.
Now things could not be better.
I still have days where I get hung up on how I look (thanks hormones and Instagram) but as with everything, we can’t be 100% happy all the time.
But I know I’m looking after myself and that’s what matters. I’m my own person, I am happy with who I am, my body’s not what you see in magazines, nor what you put as your typical PT on instagram but I’m happy because it is strong, healthy and definitively me.
