Like a lot of women my age, my relationship with my body started on shaky ground.

Growing up, the message I absorbed, from the world around me, from comparisons I couldn't escape, from comments that were never meant to cut as deeply as they did, was that my body wasn't quite right. That I was too short, too curvy, too much of the wrong things and not enough of the right ones. I internalized all of it completely, and it shaped how I saw myself for years.

It didn't help that I was born in the 80s and grew up in the 90s, when Nicole Richie was considered the fat one. The era worshipped a ultra-thin waifs, heroin chic, thigh gaps, and emaciated frames as the pinnacle of beauty. It was a strange and damaging time to be a teenage girl with curves, and like many of my generation, I absorbed those messages completely without ever questioning them.

I wasn't a passive victim of it though. I made choices, I formed beliefs, and I let those beliefs run the show for far longer than I should have.

What followed

For over two decades I tried everything. Slimming clinics, protein shake diets, marathon and ultramarathon training, keto, carnivore, plant based, you name it. Some of it worked for a while but most of it did not, and every single time the result was the same, temporary at best, miserable throughout, and completely unsustainable. I gained weight during marathon training when I expected to lose it. I started losing my hair on more than one occasion and I spent years thinking my metabolism was broken or my willpower wasn't strong enough, when really I just did not understand what I was doing (you can read more about this here).

Then an injury stopped me training entirely, and decided to focus on strength training to support my recovery with the ultimate goal of making me a better runner. To say I was terrified walking into that first session is an understatement however by the end of it I was hooked.

The Lightbulb Moment

I had fallen in love with lifting weights and with my background as a running coach, I decided to train as a Personal Trainer and that is when everything finally clicked. Through my CPT course I learned about nutrition for the first time, not diet rules or food lists, but the actual science of how the body works and why every diet I had ever tried had either worked or failed.

Fat loss is like maths. There is a formula, and once you understand it, you do not need god-like willpower or a life of dry chicken salads. You just need to understand what actually counts.

I went on to complete my Level 4 Nutrition qualification and my Level 5 in Advanced Nutrient Metabolism, because I wanted the depth to do more than hand women a plan. I wanted to help them understand their bodies well enough to keep the results without needing me standing over them.

Where I Am Now

I have stopped trying to be skinny and I am focused on being strong, well-fueled, healthy and happy instead. I am no longer obsessed over a number on the scale and ironically, I now have a better body than I have ever had in my life. I'm stronger, healthier, and finally at peace in my own skin.

I went through years of confusion, self-loathing, failed diets, and genuinely harmful approaches to my body so that I could finally understand what actually works.

I don't want anyone else to take the long way round.

That is why I do what I do.