176: What It Means to Be an Athlete Mom in Every Season of Life

Brianna Battles (00:02)
Welcome back to the Practice Brave podcast. And I wanted to talk to you about what it means to be an athlete mom now that we are officially entering at 2025. So my, I want to lead with this. Like an athlete is anyone pursuing fitness across a spectrum of interest and ability. So it doesn't mean that you have to be a competitive person. It doesn't mean that you have been a lifelong athlete.

Maybe you're somebody who found fitness later in life, but you can identify as an athlete at any age, at any given ability level. It's about consistently pursuing fitness and consistently improving or consistently pursuing improvement in your fitness and in your physicality. So I want to lead with that because I think it's really easy for people to say, well, I used to be an athlete.

or I used to do this and not want to call yourself an athlete. And I get it. I've had so many interesting comments on social media. Anytime I've like referred to myself or the people that I coach as like athlete moms, like what is an athlete mom? Like, and almost like a weird dig at that. But I think it's really, you know, we still are a new breed, so to speak.

of athlete and it's important to be able to identify as like, yes, I'm still an athlete and I'm also a mom now. Athleticism does not end when motherhood begins. And when you're an athlete, that is something that is deeply embedded into your lifestyle and into your identity. And ultimately what your family dynamic will be because it's a big part of how you live your life. And therefore it's something that your children and your family

we'll see it has an incredible effect on your life as a mom and raising children who see you pursuing something about you. I think where we've gone so wrong, this is a bit of a tangent, but where we've gone so wrong in youth sports is that parents are living through their kids because they no longer have anything that they are pursuing themselves. There's no act of betterment, of improvement, of winning, of losing, of...

and getting better at working towards something of delayed gratification and the unique sense of a dopamine hit that you get from sweating really hard or hitting a PR or trying a new movement, new sport. Like that is something that gets lost as we get older. Yet it's something that is worth pursuing. And if you're listening to this, I doubt I have to convince you of that. You already are bought in on being an athlete. But I think how we approach being an athlete,

has to ebb and flow with the season of life that we're in. So if you are in the trenches of pregnancy and postpartum, and then you're breastfeeding, and then you have like this little baby, and then you're thinking about getting pregnant again, it is really hard to find your rhythm and your identity and what being an athlete looks like for you in those early seasons and trenches of motherhood. And it doesn't have to be an all or nothing, even if you're somebody who kind of is an all or nothing person. Like I tend to gravitate towards like, I'm either like,

dialed and structured or like I'm unhinged and just not. So it is like really hard for me to find and strike some balance in that, but I've been figuring out this whole like athlete mom thing for 11 years now, which is wild to me. And what my life has looked like as an athlete has absolutely evolved over the years from, you know, being a division one college athlete to then really getting involved in triathlons and running.

in my early 20s to CrossFit and powerlifting and then just like more general strength and conditioning. My weight and my body composition has looked different through all different seasons. And in the early seasons of being a mom, I would do a lot of like nap time workouts. They weren't...

How I train now is not what I was training like when my boys were a little bit younger. I just didn't have that capacity or that energy. So what your lifestyle looks like when you are a mom and also an athlete, it kind of has, our fitness has to compliment that, not complicate it. Our fitness shouldn't be taking away from our responsibilities or even what we have in our, like our.

our mindset, right? We shouldn't be overly occupied by having to go to the gym and having to like go and, you know, make this time or hit this PR. Like it really needs to be adaptable, but that is hard for athletes to be adaptable. I think we pride ourselves on saying like, yeah, I'm like super adaptable. I'm really versatile. But like ultimately most athletes become really rigid in their training approach and their training routine. And they have to follow this program on this day at this time. And it can be really unnerving when

life naturally interrupts you. And when you're a mom, ultimately you have a lot more interruptions, regardless of how good you are at planning. Although I'm talking to my type A moms that have a really hard time adjusting their sales, so to speak, when it comes to the routine of motherhood. know my sister, for example, really struggles with that. She's so almost rigid in type A and how she wants things to be and go. And this is how I do things. This is how I want things to go. And then the reality is,

there's our expectation and then there is our reality and we have to learn how to be really fluid with that and that is a hard learning curve if you are type A and if you're type B you do need some structure because guess what it can be five o'clock at night and you're like, shit I still didn't get in that workout because like all these things happen so it is finding the messy middle of like this without thinking of our experience as an athlete as this all or nothing thing like

I'm pregnant, I can't do this. I'm postpartum, I can't do this. It's like there is an opportunity in there to figure out and redefine what being an athlete, mom, looks like for you in the given season of life that you're in, knowing as somebody who's like officially like on the other side of those like really demanding chapters where, like my body, I remember like, it's hard when your body is needed. It's hard being needed at such an extreme where you are ultimately like,

you're in charge, like whether you're growing a human or nourishing a little human to nap time hustle to, you know, just, it's just hard, like making your life work around a little baby and a toddler is tough. It is really tough. And there's a lot of things that we can do if we adjust our approach to stay in the game, even as the game looks different. So maybe you needed that little like pep talk and I know it's a bit ranty.

But I do wanna talk to you about some fundamental habits that you can build over time because where you are now is not what your life will continue to be like as an athlete, mom. And I can say that because again, I feel like I've lived so many different lives in the last decade plus of what my fitness and what my relationship with my body and my training has looked like as an athlete. And I'm settling into a really positive place with it. Again, my weight has kind of been...

all over the place for different times or different reasons and the sports and activities I do, the weights and loads that I'm lifting, the miles I'm running, the activities I'm doing, where I'm spending my time, all of that changes and it changes in a way to like complement the season of life I'm in but also like our capacity because your capacity changes over time. So I want to talk to you about a few of the things that you can do as an athlete mom that will make you a well-rounded athlete.

now and across your lifetime of athleticism. So first, first things first, I want to encourage you to lift weights three to four times a week. I think that if you're an athlete, you likely come from a background where you're like, I have to hit this percentage or this weight and I need to continually be making progress, right? Like progressive overload. And we compare, especially like

if you're postpartum, maybe you're thinking, well, I want to just be able to deadlift what I did prior. And that is fine. Like it is fine to have those goals and things to work towards. And it's OK if you are not lifting as heavy as you once did. The whole point of lifting heavy is to be lifting heavy, not lifting as heavy as you used to, but to be lifting in a way that is challenging for the season that you are in right now in a way that it complements your interest and your ability right now.

You can always make progress, but our focus has to kind of shift and evolve so that we, again, stay in the game. It's not about being as strong as you once were. It's just about being strong. And we can do that. We can be strong women in the gym without pulling a 300 pound deadlift. Like that doesn't, there's no number on the barbell that says you're strong.

The point is you are moving a barbell consistently across your lifetime. That is what makes you strong, not a certain number or metric or percentage. So stay in the gym, keep lifting. That's going to help you so much across this lifetime of athleticism. Because we were pulling some stats for the Practice Brave fitness program the other day, and I wanna pull those up really quick here. I'm sure you've heard.

through pregnancy and postpartum, obviously our bodies experience a ton of change. And then around the corner from that, depending on when you're having babies, but once you're in like your late 30s or your 40s or around the corner, you have to start looking at things like perimenopause and knowing that our body and our muscles and our bone density, all these things change over time and we have to protect that. Trying to find it on my page here.

but give me a second.

You know, I... Okay. Hello. I know where it is.

Okay.

This is a really big deal. 50 % of female athletes experience incontinence when they exercise and that can get worse as we age and unfortunately, motherhood tends to bring out that symptom for so many women. So if you're peeing when you sneeze, if you're peeing when you jump or when you lift heavy, that is something to address now because as your ligaments and tissues change as you're getting older due to hormonal shifts and changes, structural changes within your body,

Like we have to be ahead of that now. And sometimes our fitness doesn't really acknowledge the core and pelvic health needs of women. And then by the time you're 30 years old, which is honestly a huge majority of those of you listening, that's when most women begin to experience bone density loss. And then three to 8 % of muscle mass that women lose per decade starting at age 30. I'll say that again, because I kind of stumbled.

But between 3 and 8 % is the muscle mass that women lose per decade starting at age 30. So again, these are really important statistics to keep in mind when we're talking about training in a way that supports your lifetime of athleticism. It's not just about being a certain weight or body composition. At this point in your life, your pregnancy, your postpartum, and then the season of after. What is the after?

That's where so many of you are headed or getting to now or maybe within the next few years. It's figuring out a way that that compliments who you have become because there's no going back. There's no bouncing back. Even if you physically look the same, you know that mentally, emotionally, spiritually, like there's so many things about you that have changed. And while you can still be an incredible athlete, what your experience as an athlete.

looks like is probably going to be different. And ultimately you're going to be a better athlete because you have such a deeper level of understanding of your body. You're smarter with your training. You're smarter with your recovery. And there's a lot of different things that you can do to leverage your time and leverage your output, leverage your capacity. Once you find that rhythm and you get into that rhythm and you've given your body time to acclimate to the season that it is in where you're not

trying to be this badass to maintain all of your abilities during pregnancy. Maybe you trained really strategically during pregnancy and then postpartum you took your time rehabbing, recovering postpartum. Your baby's getting a little bit older. You're finding your rhythm. You've improved your core and pelvic health symptoms. You've given your body and your life a chance to adapt to this new baby. And maybe now you're turning the corner and you're like, okay, how do I train? Like, how do I really want to train in a way that feels intentional, but I'm still making progress towards being like a really good athlete.

whether you are an athlete who plays a sport or maybe you're a hobbyist, something I definitely encourage in one of my next points is to be versatile. And that can come in a lot of different ways, but I think there's so much value in trying something new. And look, if you are in the early stages of motherhood, maybe like signing up for pickleball sounds ridiculous right now and you're like, absolutely not. And like I'm not somebody who plays pickleball, so that's not necessarily my suggestion, but there's a lot of people that really love it.

But I think finding a new sport, a new activity, a new hobby can be really, really powerful. I started jiu-jitsu when Chance started going to preschool and I knew I finally had predictable childcare where I could commit to, at that time it was like a 12 o'clock class. And I was like, okay, I know that he can, I can drop him off at preschool. I can go do this class and then I can grab him and I knew I could actually finally commit to a consistent class time.

Whereas before I would like work out when he would just like nap. So committing to a class seemed crazy for a really long time and it would have been. It would not have complimented the season of life that I was in. So for me, I found a whole new sport once my little one started preschool and I had predictable child care. And that unlocked a whole new chapter of figuring out a new identity as an athlete. And that's what is possible, even if it's not possible where you're at right now.

It's the foundation that we create through these seasons of life of pregnancy, of early motherhood, of babies back to back or whatever it might be, of our different symptoms and injuries and experiences our body goes through that we create this foundation of some kind of structure so that we're setting ourselves up for the future that we have because like you are not old. You are not washed up. The glory days are not.

behind you. In fact, I would argue that your glory days are being an athlete mom. Like this is when it happens because there is nothing that I have loved more than competing in training and having my boys there and having them witness them, having them be a part of it. That is way better.

than any game I ever played in college that is way better than any race I ever competed or any competition I did prior to having kids. It is such a greater like flex. It is such a greater feeling and dopamine hit knowing that this is normal for my boys and we're creating honestly, cultural change by being moms that are still athletic, not just into fitness, but are still athletic. There's a difference between

being a mom who's into fitness and is just doing it just like for fun, you know, or for like basic health benefits and those of us that are really trying to improve ourselves. And again, it's not taking away from the season of life you're in because pursuing general fitness is fine. Like it is what most of us do for long periods of time. And then eventually your fitness can be leveraged to be more specific to getting stronger, to...

if you want, body composition changes, participating in a new sport or hobby, being able to feel really confident and versatile in what your body can do, and identifying and embodying athleticism. That feels different, and it gives you a different level of confidence to have and then to lead your family with. It is powerful for your sons and daughters to see their mom showing up that way.

where you're not trying to work out to lose weight. You're not trying to work out because you don't like this body part or that thing. You're like, no, I'm like, I'm actually trying to get stronger. I'm going to be competing in a high rocks or I'm going to be doing, I'm signing up for jujitsu. I'm going to start doing pickleball and competing there. I don't know. Like, it's just, it's a different relationship that you get to have with your body, with your performance, with your fitness. And ultimately what is still possible, it is not over.

Like not even close to being over. There's a lot of possibility ahead. So the other aspects of being an athlete mom is it sounds so boring. I know I hate it too, but like walking. Walking can be a really accessible, very easy form of movement. And I recognize also as a mom that is really hard to just, I'm just going to casually get in like 10 K steps today. That is not easy.

to It is not easy to commit to. So I would encourage you to try to get in at least 6,000 steps a day. And sometimes you can do that unintentional walkers by being really active. Some of you listening are like that is nothing that is so easy. And others like you struggle to maybe get two or 3000 steps a day. It's something to be mindful of not, you know, totally perfect with like there's gonna be days where you're way more sedentary than others and that is fine.

It's fine. I think it's just bringing more mindfulness to movement that isn't necessarily exercise. It's just general movement. It's going to help with your digestion. It's going to help with your mental health. Get some sunshine, hopefully, unless it's winter where you are like where I am right now. Ultimately, getting outside is a great reset and a way to help your body in a way that isn't super strenuous because a workout doesn't have to.

make you like pass out on the floor from the intensity to be a good source of movement for the day. I also want to encourage you to take some creatine. There's a lot of muscle and brain benefit for women. That is something that I've really tried to commit to. I have a hard time taking supplements. Like I'm just like not very good at being consistent with that. But for the last year, I've really dialed in being consistent with creatine. So I take that for me.

I add it to the oatmeal that I have in the morning and I just mix it in there because that's again been the most, that's been the best way for me to be compliant with it versus having it like in water or whatever. And again, that's what works for me. Find what works for you. And I think that that's a really positive supplement to take for muscle building, muscle preservation or recovery. And it's showing a lot of evidence to support your brain health, which we're going to need as we keep aging.

And then hydrating often. I know this is also boring. Some people like me have their emotional support water bottle and I pretty much take it everywhere. People like my husband somehow survive without like ever thinking about drinking water. I don't understand that. But being able to hydrate consistently, especially if you are somebody who is constipated or has any kind of pelvic health symptoms, really important to help, you know, hydration.

or help use hydration to help with your digestion, to help with some of those pelvic health symptoms that can be created from being constipated or not having good digestion. So being able to drink a lot of water obviously helps your skincare too. Just makes a really big difference in how you feel and how you perform. I mentioned this a little bit earlier, but just having more versatility in your fitness. I think a lot of people like to identify as, well, I do jujitsu.

I am a runner. I am a triathlete. I am a crossfitter. And while there's forms of versatility in all of these different fitness avenues, I think the ultimate goal for most of us is to be in our 50s, 60s and beyond and feel really capable and feel really athletic. So your one sport or your one form of fitness should not be your only form of fitness.

So if you are lifting, also make sure that you are maybe running sometimes. If you are running, you should also be lifting weights. And there's a lot of benefits to cross training or hybrid training or whatever people wanna call it. But it should be involved, it should be a strategic part of your training life is to yes, lift weights, but also you should be doing cardio and also you should be able to hike. There's a lot of different.

values in being able to be really versatile in what your fitness looks like. I know for me, it's a huge priority to lift weights. Usually for me about like four to five times a week. What that looks like some days are a lot more structured at least three very structured lifting days and then two to three a little bit more unstructured with like some sled work or sprints or whatever it might be.

And then I do a lot of jujitsu this season of life. I'm able to do more volume of that that was but have never worked out earlier In mom life seasons and then I like to run so I'll try to get in like one long-ish run anywhere between three and five miles Every week and that's important to me and then I love hiking so again staying fit through a variety of means is really valuable to your fitness and again, it doesn't have to be

this all or nothing. It can be even if you prioritize that once or twice a month, you know that you're going to get out and you're going to hike. Cool. Or if it's in the winter, maybe you're going to go snowboard or snowshoeing or skiing or do something just a little bit different where you are challenging your body with another form of fitness and even pursuing a new hobby, which I also think is a really important part of being an athlete mom is trying new things because so much of our identity.

tends to feel paused or lost and it's really easy to get in that like cycle of thinking of like nothing is for you anymore or that you're too old or you're too washed up or you're too hurt to try X, Y or Z but there is something new to try, a new way to use your body that you just haven't unlocked yet and there's a possibility there but ultimately it comes down to being able to keep an open mind.

and be willing to be a learner, a beginner. It's really hard sometimes, especially when you're like used to being athletic and good at stuff to go be a beginner and be a newbie and suck at something. I actually like loved that part of jiu-jitsu was that I wasn't supposed to be good at it. Like, and it felt okay for me to do it because I was like, this is so different. I've done nothing like this ever. And it was okay. Like I was honestly at a place with my own athletic maturity where I was okay sucking.

and being a total newbie because I gave myself the permission to. And so find a movement or sport or hobby or class, whatever it is that is new that you can try. And again, this doesn't have to be every week or every month, but just in general, part of your fitness ethos as an athlete mom. And I know this is probably annoying depending on

where you're at in your mom life, but prioritizing sleep. know that it is really hard when you have little babies that wake up. Sometimes my boys still come in my room and like, what are you doing? Why, you know? And it can be really hard to get good, consistent sleep, but just getting into some better sleep habits, making sure that is something that, you know, we have choices, we have circumstances. Our circumstances are kids are sick, kids aren't sleeping through the night. You're still nursing. There's just, there's circumstances, right?

block your ability to get great sleep. But then there's our choices and that could be we're choosing to stay up and watch another episode or we're choosing to not really value our sleep hygiene. And again, I say this with a lot of grace because there's so much that is not within our control, but just being more mindful of how much of a role sleep plays in our mental health, our physical health.

how we feel, how we show up and how we perform. It is a huge piece of the equation. So just bringing that again into your health and fitness ethos.

Something that I don't think is talked about a lot, especially for athlete moms, is making that appointment and following through with it. You're like, what appointment? This could be anything from a women's well physical to a long overdue dentist appointment to a mammogram. I don't know, literally any appointment. Going to the dermatologist, it is so easy to be a caretaker for every single person. Our kids have a dentist appointment. Our kids have this.

doctor appointment. Our kids have to go to this place at this time and we are constantly prioritizing what everybody else has to do and taking care of everybody else and it's really hard to follow through on what seems like, well, it's not a big deal. I'm having this symptom or I have this weird spot on my face or this, I have this weird thing that I'm feeling or thinking, I don't know, and just blowing it off, whether it's because of anxiety or time capacity or honestly any other reason. But if you have the access,

follow through on those appointments. Because if we are neglecting the very things that can truly keep us safe and be preventative, then what are we doing? know, like our fitness covers a solid foundation. Our nutrition covers a solid foundation. But there's other aspects of our health that we do need to acknowledge and lean into. And we have to be really proactive with those certain appointments.

Where we get that outside scope, that outside care, that outside feedback that all plays into trying to live the healthiest, longest life with the highest, have the highest quality of life as possible. So go ahead, make that appointment, follow through on that appointment and it's just as healthy as getting in your lifting or your conditioning or your run. Just do it. You don't even know how impactful that could be for your life.

Hopefully it's not impactful at all and it's just something you check off the list But ultimately it it could even save your life. So make that appointment Last up I believe

Here we go. I have all of this like written down. I think it's just, it's finding what works for you, knowing that even if it's different than what you used to do, like different doesn't have to be a bad thing. Different can be a really good thing. It can be a solid opportunity to improve upon the fitness that you've created through the years or the fitness that you want to create.

And you can do that with all of these things mentioned. I'm not going to like dive too much into the nutrition side of that. I'm talking more from like a strength and training perspective, but I mean, of course eating well and eating enough like that is so incredibly key. I've recorded a few episodes on that with Christie Viccaro, but just honestly making sure that you are consuming a lot of protein.

that you're mindful of that. And if you don't have good digestion, and I know I kind of like mentioned digestion a few different times out with our sleep and our walking and hydration and stuff like that, but that plays heavily in the pelvic health symptoms and plays a bigger role as we age. So being mindful of like, am I consuming enough fat to have a really healthy digestive system? And most people aren't, most people...

maybe aren't eating a lot of carbs, they're still afraid of carbs. So being able to address some of our food drama, our food worries, our food insecurities, all of that can make a really big difference in how you feel and perform and kind of once and for all, like putting our bullshit aside, right? All of us have baggage. All of us have like food, nutrition, training.

BS that comes up sometimes and can get really exposed in motherhood. It's hard to see your body change. It is hard to be out of routine. It is tempting to maybe take whatever it might be to solve our problems, whether, you know, it's like going an extreme diet or getting some kind of injection or whatever. Like we are just so desperate to feel like ourselves again, desperate for change. And we are from, we were raised amongst like a quick fix diet culture.

Society that's what we if you are in your 30s ish Plus or minus a few years, but if you're close to that decade If you're a millennial you were definitely raised amongst extreme Diet culture and extreme approaches to fitness and training We have been inundated and it is very hard to undo some of our belief systems that we have about What it means to be healthy what it means to be about fit what it means to be?

in a body that is quote good enough, especially when our bodies get changed sometimes through the seasons of motherhood. It can be so hard to see your body and have your life change. And because of that, we have to be aware of our tendencies and we have to take action in the ways that we can, which is finding like, what is our value system? How can I make my fitness and my training really work for me right now in this season of life in a way that builds a foundation or builds upon this foundation?

depending on where you're at, your focus is gonna be different and the different things I talked about today will help with that foundation and will help to build upon that foundation. The capacity is what matters and that is all so individual. So I wanna talk to you about the Practice Brave Fitness program because that is something that, it's my monthly strength conditioning program for athlete moms. And I first created this in 2020 because I took

but I was coaching in person. had a women's strength conditioning class that I was running out of a gym in Southern California. That was like how my business started was coaching women in this setting. And I took it all online during COVID and that ultimately created the practice brain fitness program. So it's this monthly workout program. And I love it because it is what I call like a really strategic strength and conditioning program for

athlete moms. I understand how hard it is to find like to find a rhythm to find structure to know, you know, like maybe the fitness you were doing before no longer serves me. Maybe you're like, I can't make it to this class. It's like, I don't have the energy for that kind of intensity or that kind of output. I don't have the interest in being in the gym for two hours every day. That is all fine. You know, I want to like tell you like you can still be an athlete even if

it looks different. Even if your body, your life and your training has changed since you became a mom, you're still an athlete. So you have to know that you're trained, you if you can train strategically with this kind of workout program, knowing that you can improve how you feel, look and perform because ultimately your training approach needs to compliment the season of life that you are in. And I feel like the practice brain fitness program was designed with all of that in mind because I was coaching moms. I was teaching

these moms how to be athletic, or I was teaching these athletes how to train in a way that really like fell more in alignment with the season of life they were in as a mom, while still really prioritizing the fact that they have performance goals. They have aesthetic goals. They want to feel and look good. And that is okay. That should be supported. So the Practice Brave fitness program is designed to help you pursue a life in method of athleticism by creating a well-rounded strategic approach to strength and conditioning.

for athlete moms, I get you, because I am you. I have been there and I've been at this coaching like this and training like this myself for years, like over 10 years. So what you can expect with practice brave is there's a strength and hypertrophy lifting focus. So for example, there's like a compound lift and then that'll be like a superset with either a core specific movement, because we're really mindful of core and pelvic health, but also.

a plyometric movement because women need to jump like like that plyometrics and high-impact training should be incorporated into your routine and it doesn't have to be done by doing like 50 box jumps and one workout and then not doing box jumps again for another like month. It's not how this works. So it's really having structured compound lifts but also structured themes to go with the compound lift that you're working on and a compound lift to be clear is like your squats, your deadlifts, your presses. But then I know like

Not everybody wants to lift super heavy, so heavy is really relative. And also in this program is a hypertrophy focus. So yes, you have your main lift that you're working off of, but then there is different accessory movements that help with the hypertrophy focus of this program. So that's training some of the smaller muscle groups to create more harmony and balance in your body. Whether you want to call that bodybuilding or hypertrophy kind of focus.

We have that as the accessories and then a conditioning portion. Now, if you are somebody who's going to be going to jiu-jitsu or who is training for a marathon, then maybe you don't need to do the conditioning focus or the conditioning component of this program. You can cut that part out. But those of you who aren't and you're like, I do want to train like different heart rate zones and feel really good there. There is a conditioning component there for you as well. And this program was designed as a way to like really complement.

Lifestyle and other hobbies and sports and goals. I want to encourage you to go out and hike I want to encourage you to go play tennis I want to encourage you to go try jujitsu. Of course, like I'm gonna say that because it's me I want to encourage you to do lots of new things and try a lot of different things because you will feel a lot better doing those So again just to keep this in mind because this is something I think like when we're so entrenched in the seasons of

Pregnancy and postpartum we forget that like there's still a life ahead for us and like you're not gonna be too old You're not I don't I literally feel better now than I did in my early 30s But you have to understand that 50 % female athletes are gonna experience incontinence when they exercise So that's when they exercise nevertheless when they sneeze or when they laugh or when they Get sick and have a coughing spell

which seems to be the thing happening right now in the winter. So again, we can address this in our training and that's what this program helps with too. It's really mindful of the fact that we have different anatomy. Our fitness should be mindful of that. It shouldn't irritate symptoms. We should have strategies to work within symptoms and improve them.

And then if you are age 30, you will experience bone density loss. It is our job to maintain the bone density that we have built through our 20s, right? Because by 30, that's when most women start to experience bone density loss. And we have to try to preserve that in as many ways as we can as we age. And most of you are right around that age where if you're not actively pursuing bone density and building that,

you are actively losing it and that has to be a wake up call to strength train and encourage a lot more high impact training. And then three to 8 % of muscle mass that women lose per decade starting at age 30. That should also kind of scare you, right? Again, we have to be proactively building muscle and that does not mean you need to be doing a 300 pound deadlift in order to build muscle, but you do have to be challenging your muscles and working consistently. That's the key.

is working consistently to maintain muscle. Otherwise you will lose it starting at age 30. So again, this workout program is between 30 to 40 minutes. It is something that you can do during a nap time. It is something you can do in the morning before your kids wake up. It is something you can get in where you can on whatever days that you have available. And it kind of checks every single box of strength training, high impact, corn pelvic health, hypertrophy training.

training and conditioning targeting all the different heart rate zones depending on the workout. So there's three weekly strengthening workouts. You get a bonus Metcon that you can do. Like I usually do that like on a Saturday, for example. It's all in the app, Train Heroic. We have a great community. You have coaching support from me and my team.

a ton of different movement demo videos and three different training series to choose from, whether you have access to a full gym or really limited equipment, or you just want to do like the onboarding version, whatever you need. And all of that right now is priced at $35 a month. So you can have this kind of consistent strength conditioning and access to me to coach you for $35 a month. And I will say this is the program that I encourage.

Literally anybody who's ever like, hey, can you coach me? What do think I should do? I'm like, this is what I think you should do because it has the structure that you're looking for and you can get stronger as you go at your own rate and also have like really well-rounded fitness where I know that you're also developing full body strength and it's not just your main lifts and it's not just high intensity. You're really being mindful and intentional with.

having more balance in your body, training all of your muscles. Ultimately, it's gonna keep your joints and your tissues a lot healthier and a lot happier because it doesn't have to be a workout that leaves you on the floor out of breath for it to be a good workout. You don't have to be deadlifting 400 pounds in order for it to be a challenging workout. You can make it what it needs to be for you and know that you're gonna become a better athlete because now you're being a strategic athlete.

And that's what I really want to teach women how to do is like be strategic with your training so that you can pursue this lifetime of athleticism and be very versatile. So when someone asks you to go snowboarding with them, you can say yes. When someone wants you, when you want to like, you know, go and do different activities with your kids, you feel really competent and comfortable saying yes to these things. I personally want to be like my mom who by the way did not start doing anything, any kind of like movement and exercise in the gym until she was in her mid 50s.

And now she's, she's retired now. She skis multiple times a week during the summer. She goes on these long bike rides. She hikes. She is free to say yes to whatever she wants to do because she has created a really solid foundation of fitness without like using and abusing her body. There's a way to be strategic and we have to get ahead of that.

We have to preserve our bodies, we have to challenge them, and we have to do it in a way that really compliments the season of life that we're in. And I feel really confident in this program because I've seen it serve so many different women very well across their athletic journey, from professional athletes to hobbyists. And wherever you fall on that spectrum, I feel like this could be a really positive program for you. So if this is something that you're interested in, I wanted to talk about it on this episode since we've been chatting a bit about

what it means to be a well-rounded athlete mom. And that's just owning where you're at, understanding where you're at, understanding what your tendencies are, the season of life that you're in, and what's actually in your control. Again, we have the uncontrollables and we have the things that, know, choices and circumstances, and we can choose to structure our training in a way that's gonna keep us in the game in the most sustainable and healthy way as possible long-term. It is about this lifetime of athleticism.

and building that, creating that, and what that looks like is going to vary season to season, depending on where you're at. And I want to support you through that. If you're pregnant, I got you. I have a whole separate program for that, the Pregnant Athlete Training Program. If you are newly postpartum, I have the eight-week postpartum athlete training program. And I appreciate those seasons. My whole business is focused on supporting pregnant postpartum athletes. And yet, it's on behalf of...

of this, this lifetime of athleticism, right? It's teaching women how to train throughout their lifetime prior to getting pregnant, during pregnancy, during postpartum, and now this open-ended chapter where there's nothing but possibility and we work within what our choices are, what our circumstances are, and we create an adaptable relationship with our training, with our fitness, with our nutrition.

so that we can pursue this lifetime of athleticism so that we feel like we are living the highest quality of life possible in the one body that we have. We will never be this young again. So we have an opportunity to take advantage of what we've been given, the circumstances that we're in and make the most of it. And I wanna teach you how to train in a way that will help you pursue your own version of whatever a lifetime of athleticism looks like for you.

So I'd love to have you join the Practice Brave Fitness program. And if you wanna learn more, there's show notes, there's a link in the show notes that you can check out where you can learn more about this aspect of coaching that I do. If you're really passionate about this is how I coach, this is how I train personally. And I'd love to invite you to do that with me and learn a new way to approach your relationship with your body, with your training and with your overall lifestyle.

I'm here to support you. Thank you so much for listening. And if you're listening this early on, Happy New Year.