(CW: disordered eating and talks about weight loss)

At 3.5 years postpartum I signed up for Olympic weightlifting. If you don’t know - Olympic weightlifting is a sport where you train to lift heavy barbells from the ground to overhead (snatch and clean and jerk). It was the part of CrossFit I loved the most, and it’s been SO GREAT to have a sport just for ME again.

It’s not wrong to have weight loss as a goal. But when it's our sole focus, we may miss out on all the other innumerable benefits exercise provides.

Is it weight loss? Body changes? It’s ok if this is you. This was 💯 me for the longest time.

Maybe it’s time to redefine what “working” means to you. If we solely rely on weight loss or body changes as a measure of success, we might end up quitting when those things aren’t happening. But in reality, other crucial health markers are improving. Yet we might not acknowledge them because weight loss has our focus.

These podcast episodes might be of interest to you that touch on these topics:

• Episode #39: Healing your relationship with food with Jordana Edelstein

• Episode #18: Diastasis, Hernias, Prolapse and Decolonizing Fitness with Inemesit Graham

• Episode #16 - 5 reasons your current exercise routine may not be working for you

• Episode #11: Postpartum Fitness and Body Image with Jessie Mundell

“Working” could mean things like:

✓ Improvements in mental health
✓ Better sleep
✓ More energy
✓ Less stiffness
✓ Fewer aches and pain
✓ Improved strength
✓ Better libido
✓ Experiencing more joy and excitement in your life

The list goes on…

Healing your relationship with exercise (and food) takes time. It may require therapy, coaching, curating your IG feed and lots of ups and downs.

But it is possible. And it is SO FREEING.

I sat with his response, and sat with my feelings for a few days. I was still considering what it would take to lose 2kg. I thought to myself 4lbs isn’t THAT much right?

The next few days I caught myself falling into old behaviours and thought patterns. I started weighing myself each morning (which I hadn’t done in YEARS). I started thinking about what I could “cut out” of my daily eating routine. I started thinking maybe I’ll just go for longer walks everyday.

2-3 days went by this way when all of a sudden I woke up one morning with such clarity. I decided - NO. I will not do this to myself. Even if it’s “just” 4lbs. It isn’t worth undoing all the hard work I’ve done to get where I am today.

That day I signed up for the larger weight category.

I felt so at peace with this decision. And it served as a reminder that regardless of how much work we do to improve our relationship with food, our bodies and exercise, we may never be fully “healed”. We can still fall into old habits that are so ingrained. Especially when we live in a world where diet culture still runs rampant.

I’m proud of myself for working through this challenging situation and choosing ME and my mental health in the end. This is definitely something to celebrate.

Boundaries in my business

Because of my history with disordered eating, I have a boundary in my business NOT to sell intentional weight loss.

I will also never weigh or measure my clients. Or use their body size as a measure of progress to assess whether my fitness programs were “working”.

This is also why I will NEVER use before and after pictures in my marketing material. I will also NEVER use MY body as a billboard for my business.

You can read more about my story and why I set this boundary in this blog post.

Important Note:

I acknowledge my thin privilege in this conversation. It can be so much harder to make these decisions for those in larger bodies that have insurmountable pressure from society, the medical community, family/ friends to lose weight.

My hope is one day we live in a world where body size isn’t our primary measure of someone’s health and worth.

Ps - if you're in a space to take a deep dive into unlearning diet culture and improving your relationship with your body, I HIGHLY recommend Chrissy King's book The Body Liberation Project. I finished it yesterday and I already want to read it again.

Thank you so much for being here!

Reach out to me if you ever want to chat!

About the Author

Rhonda Chamberlain (PT) is a  mom to 2 girls, physiotherapist and postpartum fitness coach.

She helps busy moms return to exercise with realistic, sustainable fitness plans that they can FINALLY stick with!

She has been practicing as a physiotherapist since 2010. She started her own virtual physiotherapy and fitness coaching business in May 2020 with a focus on postpartum women.

She attained her Pregnancy and Postpartum Athleticism (P&PA) Coach Certificate in March 2020 and she has continued to learn and expand into this specialty since.

Her mission is to help busy moms return to exercise feeling supported and encouraged. She can help you to ditch the all-or-nothing mindset and show you that it is possible to fit exercise into your busy #momlife!