Nurture Movement

Love having Carol in our small-group Pilates sessions 🤍

She’s been coming for years and really stuck at it.

There’s a big difference between accepting that your body is changing and accepting that you can’t do things anymore.

Carol’s goal is so specific.

She doesn’t want to “dodder about” 😂

She wants to walk at pace, travel, climb the steps and keep doing the things she enjoys well into retirement.

And she’s no longer worried about losing her mobility.

That’s a pretty good reason to keep showing up.

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As a Pilates teacher I thought I had it all worked out 😏 ….but

I feel ashamed to admit that, as someone who felt really proud of how easily my body had coped through pregnancy, still working up to 9 months, I thought that I would ‘bounce back’ into teaching Pilates in no time at all.

I looked around at the people who’d had children and, in a flippant way, thought they made it look harder than the reality actually was.

I did lack huge empathy.

But what did happen took me by surprise because I really wasn’t coping.

My body was leaking from every or***ce. I didn’t feel like just my own anymore. Living for two people was more demanding and unpredictable than I ever anticipated.

I looked at myself in the mirror. Even looking at my hand in front of me, it was unrecognisable. This felt terrifying.

I missed the person that was a little nervous, yet excited to have a baby.

I was spiralling downhill faster than I could get my head around. It wasn’t obvious to me, but to others around me it was.

I had postnatal depression.

Being out of tune with my body and my emotions felt like a huge loss of self and control.

I needed to build again, build differently, because the landscape had changed completely.

I stopped expecting that I could go back to being a person without a baby.

It wasn’t just about the body going back.

Experience has taught me so much. I understand the changes and shifts that happen in people, physically and emotionally.

When people come to Pilates, there’s a lot of nuance. It’s not just about the exercise.

They might be looking for a route to filling up the tank.

They might be coming because they’ve lost touch with their bodies. Perhaps they’ve been through things that have changed them forever.

I understand that transitions are not straightforward.

When I look at someone in the Pilates studio, in the room, I’m not just working with the body.

I’m aware of everything else that is going on in that person’s life.

Pilates gave me a completely different way of relating to a body that, at 26, I’d started to feel quite disconnected from.

Some come and go. Some stay.

Sometimes Pilates is exactly what you’re looking for. Sometimes it isn’t, or perhaps it’s just not the right time.

And that’s fine and dandy.

After 26 years of teaching, I find it fascinating to see who stays, who surprises me and who finds their way back later 🧡

Maybe you’ve already spotted yourself somewhere in this post 👀

Lessons I’ve had to learn ⤵️

🙋‍♀️ Your body often reacts before your mind has had a chance to catch up.

🫠 Your nervous system is responding before you’ve even decided what to do.

😎 One of the most valuable things 26 years of Pilates and movement has taught me is body awareness.

🤩 Noticing signals and staying curious, over fear and quick response.