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Connect with Madeline

📲 Instagram: @coachmadscoats

Episode Transcript

Ryann

I have such a great episode today. I have Madeline with us and she is going to be sharing all the goods about working out and just finding a love for movement again. Y’all know that I am so obsessed with movement but in a way where it gives me so much life now instead of taking away from my life, which it did for so long. So Madeline, thank you so much for coming on today. I’m really excited for this and to be able to talk to you about this.

Madeline

Yeah, of course. Thank you so much for inviting me. I’m really excited.

Ryann

Yay. All right. So before we dive in, just so everybody can get to know you a little bit better. And just to kind of kick this episode off with some icebreakers. Share with everybody, where are you from?

Madeline

So I am from Michigan. I grew up about an hour north of Detroit. And if I was in person with you, I would show you my hand and tell you that I’m from right here.

Ryann

And what is the snack that you absolutely cannot live without?

Madeline

I love, oh, that’s a hard one. Either nachos, like a good plate of just tortilla chips with cheese on them.

Ryann

So underrated.

Madeline

Or Sour Patch watermelons.

Ryann

Yum, yum. Fill in the blank. The thing I know way too much about is.

Madeline

Thing I know way too much about is my husband.

Ryann

Oh my gosh, I feel that too.

Madeline

My husband.

Ryann

Oh my gosh, I feel that so much. I feel it so much. What is your number one beauty product?

Madeline

Oh, sunscreen, 100%. Like a good moisturizer with sunscreen in it is like the best.

Ryann

What is your favorite brand?

Madeline

I use the Cetaphil brand. I have for years. It’s my all-time holy grail favorite.

Ryann

Love it, love it. What is your favorite way to move your body?

Madeline

I love strength training and Pilates. Those are my two favorites.

Ryann

Oh my gosh, I just started doing Pilates. I feel like I’m hearing about that so much more well megaform and I know that they’re technically different but I am obsessed I was like why did I not start this sooner it’s so good it’s so good we’ll dive into that deeper later oh my gosh

Madeline

oh yeah

Ryann

okay you just won a contest and now get an endless supply of a product of your choice what would you

Madeline

Honestly, probably like a beauty product like mascara or foundation, something like that. I love to buy it, but I hate to spend money on it, you know? That would be great.

Ryann

How do you take your coffee?

Madeline

I actually don’t drink coffee for religious reasons.

Ryann

Whoa. Do you drink like tea or have any special drink or just water?

Madeline

Um, I’ve never really been a drink person Honestly, like my husband is the type of person that will like stop at the gas station If we’re on a road trip, he like needs a drink and I’m like meh whatever Although I am a recent convert to the whole like McDonald’s diet Coke is the best thing ever. And I don’t have it all the time, but like, if I’m going to McDonald’s, which is rare, I must have Diet Coke.

Ryann

Oh my gosh. Crunchy or smooth peanut butter?

Madeline

Oh, smooth peanut butter. 100%.

Ryann

How many alarms do you snooze before you get up in the morning?

Madeline

One. One. Or I guess I don’t snooze. I don’t snooze. I’ve never been a snoozer. I wasn’t thinking –

Ryann

No way! Me either. You’re the first person that I’ve met that is not a snoozer as well. Everybody thinks I’m crazy, but it goes off and I get up.

Madeline

Like, what’s the point of setting your alarm 45 minutes before you have to actually get up?

Ryann

Thank you. Thank you.

Madeline

But I’m with you. People are like, wait, you don’t snooze your alarm. What’s wrong with you? And I’m like, but I get to get better sleep for longer. So really what’s wrong with you?

Ryann

Exactly. And the last one that I have before we dive in is what does food freedom mean to you?

Madeline

Food freedom means that you can be free of stress around food. Like, you don’t have to worry about the calories. You don’t have to worry about when you’re gonna burn it off in your workout. You don’t have to worry about how much protein or like carbs or fat. Like it’s just looking at something and being like, wow, that sounds amazing in my mouth, please.

Ryann

So beautiful. I love that. All right, Madeline, what is your story? How’d you get to where you are? How did you build this healthy relationship with food and body? What got you interested in fitness and nutrition? Tell us everything.

Madeline

Okay, it’s kind of a long story, so you can cut me off at any point if you want. Growing up, I would work out, but only in a group setting with my softball team or volleyball tryouts or whatever. So I played sports, but I wasn’t really into running or lifting or anything like that. In fact, I actually felt pretty weak growing up. Like I had friends that were a lot stronger than I was and I knew that, but it didn’t really drive me to do anything until I went to college in Utah and I moved out there with like no friends, no family close by and my roommates were all like, hey, we’re going to the gym. And I was like, okay, I guess I’ll go to the gym because I want friends.

So that kind of kicked off my gym going days. Like I had one pair of tennis shoes, okay? Like I did not even dabble before then. And then I started running because, you know, you want to get skinny and you do cardio, right? Like that’s what you’re taught. So, I did a lot of running and I was kind of like skinny fat. Like I wasn’t getting the tone that I wanted. So, I turned to Pinterest because obviously Pinterest knows everything. And I fell for the, you know, lose all your cellulite in 30 days, like do this workout. And I started touching weights, but like it was a little bit scary. So I started just lifting with my roommates and hoped and prayed that I could just get rid of all of the cellulite on my body.

And my fitness kind of developed to the point where I had a friend who was a trainer, and I decided to hire her to make me a workout program with some nutrition, I guess it was a nutrition plan, before my wedding. And so for a month, I literally ate the same thing every day, did the same workouts like five days a week. And I started kind of going downhill after that in terms of like my relationship with food and exercise because I saw what that strictness did for me. And I was pleased with the results at the time, but I didn’t know long-term how much it would affect me.

So after that, I tracked macros for about a year and a half, all this while I was in college and like learning about nutrition. And they don’t really teach you a whole lot about like, I mean they do, but they don’t teach you and get into like the nitty-gritty of like how calories and like relationship with food go together. So I was learning about nutrition things, but not enough to like help me identify So during that like year and a half time of tracking macros, I started working at a gym in a cafe, like in the cafe of the gym. And I saw how they kind of like glorified the trainers. And at that point I really did enjoy exercise, like it wasn’t torturous for me.

So I got certified as a trainer, I got certified as a nutrition coach, all within the span of like six months. And I started training people all while in the background, I had this like really unhealthy relationship with food because I would even track things down to like, oh, so a good example is we worked, so in the cafe, they wanted us to be able to give the members of the club a good experience and that meant that we had to taste and like sample all of the things that we had so we can be like, oh yeah, this would go well with this or this tastes like this, whatever. So in the peak of my tracking, we sampled different protein bars. And I probably tried like the tiniest square, like less than an inch of a protein bar. And I went through and scanned probably like 12 different labels and tracked like 1/16th of a protein bar. Like it was really not great.

Ryann

And the most insane, like, and I don’t want to say insane, but just the craziness about disorder eating is that I’m sure when you did that, and I know that I did a lot of things similar, like we very logically do it, like we rationalize in our head, like we don’t see that as being crazy or it’s like, yeah, I’m going to try every single one of these.

Madeline

Yeah, exactly. That’s exactly how I felt. So I was very passionate at that point about exercise. Like I really, I always knew that I wanted to help people, but I didn’t know that it would lead me to being a personal trainer and being in the nutrition like realm.

So yeah, that came to a point where I was coaching people on like having a good relationship with food, because that’s how I learned how to be a coach, but I wasn’t actually doing it myself. And in a way, I was kind of like, almost like self-righteous about it. I was on a high horse in my head because I was like, oh, I’m doing the superior thing by doing the most strict form and most difficult form of tracking food, which is like macro counting to the T, you know, kind of what led me to a point of healing my relationship with food because I got down to like such a lean body weight, like I was very lean and it really just like messed with my mood and my hormones were all out of whack and I was sleeping terribly and I just didn’t enjoy my workouts anymore. It all just kind of became very sad, if I’m being honest. Like I was like, why is this thing that I was once so passionate about now the cause of my distress?

Like that is very unsettling to me. and tried to like stop tracking and just try to find ways to move my body that I actually enjoyed instead of what I thought I should be doing and that’s what brought me to this point right now.

Ryann

I love it so much and oh my gosh those words that you said at the end were so powerful there that this one thing that I love so much was kind of destroying my life. And I think that that’s what happens is all of this starts off very innocently, right? And just like you said, I was kind of on this high horse and I was the same as well where I was like, this is discipline. Like I am so disciplined. Like I am so great, I can do this, but not being able to zoom out and see the larger picture that, okay, yes, I’m getting my macros or calories or whatever perfected, but I’m not going out and seeing my friends. I’m spending all day counting numbers. I literally just eat to be able to fuel my workouts and that’s it.

I never wanna do anything else because quite literally I don’t have energy to do anything else and my life is gym count and do whatever I can to get the number on that scale to go down and It is one of those things where not only can it take us out of our lives, but also it can really really break that relationship with movement and repairing that relationship to go from that to then step into having a healthy relationship where you can work out and have it not be about calories is so hard. So I would love to know from you, coming from that, what are some benefits of movement in general and some benefits that you felt that have nothing to do with weight loss?

Madeline

I love focusing on these things because it’s just such a different way to look at movement and fitness in an overall broad way of thinking about your health. So some of my favorite things to track thinking about your health. So, um, some of my favorite things to track are like, are you sleeping better? Are you able to lift more weight? Are you able to run longer without feeling winded? Are you just like the easy, are you enjoying your food?

Ryann

Right.

Madeline

Just like so many small things that you wouldn’t traditionally think about, but are so important that I just love. Those are just a couple, but there’s like mental health, physical health, all of the things can be in some way quantified, just like on a scale of one to ten. Like how did that workout feel? Or how did you sleep last night? Or like, what’s your mood today? Just easy things to track that you can see over time improve by a lot. And that can be your source of satisfaction instead of stepping on your scale and being like, well, I look leaner, but the scale says the same number, so I must not be doing it right.

Ryann

Right, right, totally. And I think that in turn, that can also help boost body image. And I know for me that helped boost body image when I started to focus on these different things that I was able to do with my body and be able to set these goals and focus on my workouts with these goals of running further or faster or I’ve never been able to touch my toes, flexibility is one of those things. You know with in elementary school when we had to do the presidential fitness test, the flexibility one was always the one that helped me back. But anyways, I was thinking about this actually yesterday. yesterday, so I’m currently training for a half marathon and I ran a distance yesterday that I haven’t been able to run in a really long time.

And when I finished my run yesterday, I was like, whoa, like that’s so cool. Like two weeks ago I was struggling to run two miles less and now I’m two miles more and I felt good and like, that is really cool. Like I can quite literally feel my legs getting stronger. And I, you know, it is one of those things that when you can set those goals for something other than weight loss, oh, it helps so much. So I would love to know from you, especially because you were such a macro counter, how did you detach yourself and let go of the numbers?

Madeline

I, to be very honest with you, it took me a really long time. Like I, like I said, I tracked macros for like a year and a half. And I was dead set on that being the best way to achieve the physique that I wanted. Um, and a couple of things happened. The first was I decided that I was done feeling like crap. And one of the things that I decided needed to change was my tracking. It was kind of a situation where I was like, you know what? I just need to go cold turkey. Like don’t touch the app. Don’t open it. Don’t reinstall it. Like nothing. And I know that doesn’t work for everybody, but I just, like, needed to be done. Because it was consuming me. And I’ll be honest. I went back to it a couple of times. Like I would just download it and be like, no, no, it’s okay. Like I just need to check and make sure that I am intuitively quote unquote, like, um, hitting the numbers that I need to be hitting.

Um, and slowly I just kind of let go of that, but it took probably another year and a half on top of that, probably within the last, you know, six or eight months or so, it has really been like I’m truly free, but that’s on top of, you know, another year of going without it. So first I decided I needed to be done and second was just taking off my Apple Watch which like I know that some people love it for like time and other things and that’s wonderful but I had I think it was hundred plus day streak of closing all of my rings, which was just like insane. Like I would not recommend that to anyone because I wasn’t resting and so my body was like short-circuiting like, uh, you need a break, friend, and I wasn’t listening until pretty much quarantine like forced me to not.

But otherwise, I think for me, the method that worked was just cold turkey, detaching, and going back to what I talk to my clients about all the time, just like finding your why. Why are you doing this? And I realized that I had been trying to change my body for seven years, like seven years of just looking at myself and being like, Oh, I wish this wasn’t flabby or I wish this was rounder or flatter or blah, blah, blah, blah. So like seven years had finally made me implode basically. And I was like, okay, it’s time for a complete overhaul.

Ryann

Yeah. And I so appreciate you saying that it took time because we have this expectation of, I’m just gonna delete the app and I’m gonna be okay. But the reality is, is when you’ve been building this neurological wire in your brain so strongly with these numbers, it takes time to let go of that. And even with the Afghan, how did you deal with the mental tracking?

Madeline

Oh, it was, it was bad. And it’s funny that you say that because that like, after tracking for so long, you can look at something and be like, oh, that’s a half cup of this and it has many calories. Or that’s this much protein. I know that that has this much. So I know that I just need to eat this much. And I wish that I had some fancy answer for you, but really it was just time. It just took a lot of time. Like, you know, after you break up with someone, the first, you know, six months is torture and you see something and you’re like, oh, they had a hat like that, or they had shoes like that, or we went to this restaurant together. It’s the same with the app. Like-

Ryann

Such a good reference.

Madeline

It just takes time, which nobody wants to hear, but it’s true.

Ryann

Yeah, I mean, you’re quite literally breaking up with the numbers. It is something that you have to grieve and let go of and time heals. So coming off of that, if someone is no longer tracking and is rebuilding this healthy relationship with movement and genuinely loves working out and does a lot of training because that’s what makes them feel well, how do they know that they’re eating enough to fuel their workouts? And I know that that’s harder to answer, so I’m going to ask you this instead. How do you know that you’re not eating enough to fuel your workout.

Madeline

If you want a way to keep track of it, whatever you use to log your workouts, whether it’s a app or a journal, or if you don’t do any of those, you can just open up a little note in your phone and say, okay, scale of one to 10, how drained do I feel? Or, um, how difficult was that workout? 10 being like, I’m absolutely dead. You know, if you run, for example, you could be like at mile 2.75, I felt like a crash or, you know, something that’s not so numbers driven in the way that can be harmful, but you’re still able to look back on those workouts and be like, okay, maybe keeping gentle food log of like, okay, this is what I had to eat pre-workout and like, that’s the only thing that you write down and that’s the only thing that you worry about.

I would say the energy levels that you have afterwards can be a great place to start and then if you are feeling like you didn’t have enough energy, calories are energy. So you might need to be the person that, you know, if you work out in the morning, let’s say you’re not hungry in the morning necessarily, but your workouts are trash, you might have to come up with some sort of fuel for before your workout. And that counts, you know, for any time of the day, but I know a lot of people work out in the morning, so.

Ryann

Right, and I love, you know, just taking note of that stuff because reflecting is the only way that we can really remember and learn and grow. And I think for me, it was also looking at how much energy did I have for my workouts and also how much energy did I have for the rest of my day? Because for so long it was, I am just eating enough for me to be able to do this workout and that’s it. And so looking at okay but how did the rest of my day go was such a huge game-changer for me. So going off of what you said, what are some pre-workout, fuel, or post-workout meals to have if, you know, strength training and muscle building recovery is the goal?

Madeline

So I actually made a post about this on Instagram Not too long ago. So if you don’t mind, I’ll just like reference that because yeah It’s a good. I don’t know a good reference tool. I’m really big about like hand portions. If you really need some way to like quantify or like identify how much of something to eat. So about two to three hours before you exercise, it’s good to go for like solid food because it has enough time to digest. So with that goal in mind, if you have, this is a general recommendation for female athletes specifically, but one palm size of protein, one thumb size of fats, one cupped handful of carbohydrates, and one fist size serving of vegetables.

And if you, just like a side note, the fats and the vegetables that you choose, because they have enough time to digest, is fine, like two to three hours before, but anything closer than that, your digestive system is going to have a real uncomfy time if you’re going into your workout with like a high fat, high fiber mass of food that it’s trying to digest. So just as a warning to everyone from personal experience. And then if you’re going into it and you only have like an hour or less before you work out, a liquid type of meal is a great, great, great option. So if you have like a scoop of protein with a thumb size of fat, some water or milk or almond milk, and like a fist of spinach or something like that with some fruit is another one of my like absolute favorites.

Ryann

What about like people that work out in the morning that aren’t gonna have veggies and eggs before they go work out at 6 a.m. What do you suggest to early morning workout people?

Madeline

So, there is a product actually called You Can. It’s a slow-releasing carbohydrate, and what it does is you just mix it into your drink, like a shaker bottle or something like that, and it doesn’t spike your insulin levels too much, like if you were to eat some other carbohydrate source before you worked out. And I say carbohydrates because they generally will break down the fastest and be available to your muscles so that your muscles can actually use it during your workout, as opposed to any of the other macronutrients that might take a little bit longer to digest and therefore not help you at all during your workout. So yeah, just, I like the You Can because it’s a steady, like slow-releasing carbohydrate. But if you don’t want to like use any type of product, which is totally fine, go for like a banana or an apple or just like something that’s fairly easy to digest and easy to grab and go.

Cause I personally work out in the mornings and I don’t want to like stand around and like make eggs. Like you said, like you don’t know people that eat spinach and eggs before they work out, right? So yeah, if you don’t have time to make like a little quick like protein shake or something, one, maybe make it the night before and just keep it in the fridge so you can, like, it will separate, but that’s what the little blender is for, so you can just shake it up. Or, yeah, just like grabbing a piece of fruit. And that’s another thing, like, that might be enough for you, and if it’s not, try something else.

Ryann

Yeah, so what about post-workout? How soon after, and what are some helpful things to have?

Madeline

So, first things first, don’t freak out if you can’t have protein right after you exercise. That is a recently debunked myth that you don’t have to eat your protein immediately following your workout. I would say, your question was how soon after. So if you want to optimize your gains, There is some research that says within an hour and a half is like ideal, but other research actually says that it depends more on your total fueling for the day as opposed to what you eat immediately before and after. That being said, if you don’t eat anything, like if you don’t have a main meal before you exercise, eating a main meal afterwards is better so that you have some things available to rebuild your muscles.

So things like, you know, it could be like one of my favorites is like a sweet potato with some egg whites and I put like, like you said, like some spinach in there or like salsa and then either like almond butter or coconut oil with cinnamon on the sweet potato, that’s like one of my go-to’s. Even like protein shake after with like a balance of carbs and fats, like banana and peanut butter is one of my favorites. Yeah, just anything that has a good balance of protein, carb, fat is great.

Ryann

Great. And I think your point about zooming out and looking at the larger picture of the day is really the primary focus. You know, I am always curious just to know from a nutritionist perspective, but I do agree in the sense of at the end of the day, just your overall diet or balanced eating throughout the day is really the end-all be-all there. So I want to dive in now to low-impact and high-impact movement. Can you kind of differentiate between the two and give us a brief overview of the benefits between low-impact versus high-impact?

Madeline

When I hear low impact versus high impact, I’m thinking you could do jump squats, which would be a very high impact, pretty hard on your knees and ankles and back. When I hear low impact, the low impact version of that would just be a bodyweight squat. Is that kind of what you mean? Let me rephrase that. Let’s do low intensity versus high intensity. Low intensity exercise to me and my clients is when your heart rate doesn’t cross over, you know, like 120, 130-ish. Like you’re steady breathing, but it’s not anything too crazy, like that kind of thing, right?

Ryann

Yeah.

Madeline

Is that what you’re like referencing? Okay, cool. And like high intensity exercise would be like, you’re really pushing it, it’s like an eight or nine or 10 on a scale of one to 10, like you’re breathing heavy, you’re pushing super hard, your watch might tell you that you’re burning more calories, that kind of workout. So I, you wanna know which one is more beneficial or?

Ryann

What’s the benefits of both first and then we’ll go from there.

Madeline

Okay, so the benefit of low impact or low intensity workouts is that when your heart rate is in those lower heart rate zones, it actually, your body prefers to burn fat. So a lot of times people that are wanting to get into shape, maybe they like wanna lose body fat or just like overall feel better, that’s where you should spend like 80% of your workout time is in the lower heart rate zones, in that lower impact area, which is in my opinion, one of the best like benefits, like even taking a walk outside, you know, it gets your heart rate up a little bit and that’s why so many fitness professionals reference walking so much because it’s amazing and your body likes to be in that space.

Benefits of high intensity are more obvious for people who are either like training for something or looking to improve their endurance. So like you with running and like training, I don’t like your program probably has you doing some more high intensity days and then more like low intensity, not rest days, but days that you’re not pushing quite so much. And that balance between sticking with 80% of your time being in that lower intensity space and 20% roughly of your time in the higher intensity space is going to give you a very well-rounded and sustainable program.

Ryann

So how many days of each would you recommend if somebody wanted a well-rounded program just health-wise, feeling-wise, energy-wise?

Madeline

So what’s the goal? Just like overall feeling better, like improving fitness in general?

Ryann

Yeah, balance, mixing it up, doing different things, feeling strong, while also maintaining endurance.

Madeline

So I would say no more than two high intensity days. So if we’re saying this in terms of like cardio, whether it’s like elliptical, treadmill, bike, whatever, just to give us a frame. I would program it out to be two days, let’s say like Tuesday, Thursday, you have HIIT sprints. Like, you’re sprinting for 30 seconds and resting for a minute, two days a week. And you do that six to eight times, and that’s your workout. That’s another thing, like, people will be like, that’s not enough of a workout, and then they’ll add something on top of that. Don’t do that.

Just stick with it and trust the process. And then, so that would be like two days, and then if you’re working out like five days a week, the other three days, like Monday, Wednesday, Friday, I would put some more like lower intensity, maybe like a 30 to 45 minute walk or light jog or something like that. So it’s a good like mix of each of them, but it’s nothing that’s too crazy. And as you build your strength and as you build your endurance, you can either like your work period longer or your rest period shorter, and that’s a really easy way to kind of like mix things up, give yourself a little change on your own.

Ryann

So I, going off of that, I would love for you to do some myth busting and kind of just filling us in, because I know that this is something that I really struggled with, was with was feeling like if I didn’t do X amount of cardio or if I didn’t burn X amount of calories then I would gain weight or I would lose my progress or that that workout didn’t necessarily count. Like I really had a fear of letting go of my cardio days and moving into weight training. Now I’ve seen the benefits now, and I’m so happy that I have, but I know a lot of people struggle with that as well. So can you kind of talk more about that?

Madeline

Yeah, for sure. I think that just from interviewing hundreds of people, hundreds of women and men, based on like what their fitness goal is, you know, a lot of times it is either, I want to lose weight or I want to get toned, right? Like that’s a pretty common goal and like why people are interested in cardio. I think a big myth and like social media is doing a decent job about debunking this lately, you are a woman who gets into lifting weights, you’re going to get bulky, right? Like that is, even for me, I was like, I don’t want to get bulky, I just want to get toned, you know? So like, give me the baby five pound and tell me to do 20 tricep kickbacks and like that’s what I’ll do, you know?

But if you start lifting weights and it just so happens that you get immensely bulky, please let me know because you would have unlocked a magical, crazy phenomenon that bodybuilders around the world would just absolutely love to know what you did. Because the likelihood that you would start lifting weights and get to a place where you look like a professional bodybuilder is just so unlikely I can’t even put words to it. Like it is not gonna happen unless you are really really really wanting it to. So that’s the first myth I guess is that lifting weights is not gonna make you bulky unless you’re like actually trying to get bulky. And that means that your nutrition has to be on point and your program that you’re following is also on point. And it’s probably not gonna lead you to that point.

So don’t be scared of that. And also giving up your cardio days in exchange for weightlifting days can bring you the benefits and the result that you’re actually looking for. You can burn a lot of calories doing five super high intensity workouts every week and your watch will tell you that you burned 500 calories and you’ll feel great about yourself. But the thing that happens with your body afterwards is that it doesn’t really do a whole lot. Like you burned your calories during the session and then afterwards it kind of stops and it doesn’t really do a whole lot else.

And when you exchange that in contrast with weightlifting, your body actually burns more calories like it continues to burn calories post-workout. So even when you’re not exercising, you’re actually burning calories throughout the day because of the strength training. So really, it’s like what’s the best thing for your bucks? Weight training.

Ryann

I just switched from doing Orange Theory, which I was like, this is great, I love it, and it’s high intensity, and I’m burning so many calories, and this is great. And then I switched about a year ago to more weightlifting, and then recently I’ve switched and done even less cardio and now Pilates and my body is stronger and fitter than it’s ever been and I haven’t changed anything other than that. And I was like, okay, I don’t know why I didn’t trust this process sooner, but it’s so hard to not let go of the numbers. And I think that having an understanding of what actually happens in our body can be really helpful in letting go of just wanting to have the high numbers to building strength, feeling stronger, getting faster, running further, and just makes it more enjoyable as well.

Madeline

Absolutely. Yeah, it doesn’t feel so It doesn’t feel so much like a trap like, oh I ate this food, so now I have to burn this number number so then I can be happy with my body but like being honest with yourself are you actually happy with your body? Like probably not.

Ryann

Alright last question that I have for you for anybody who is currently struggling with enjoying movement whether that be they’ve never really loved movement or they’ve tortured themselves with movement for so long, now they just don’t like it because they can’t separate it. What is something that you suggest to do to kind of bring that enjoyment back? Because there are so many benefits to movement and it can be such a great thing for us to have in our lives.

Madeline

I think to add to that, it can be difficult when movement isn’t enjoyable because for me, I, when I realized that I wasn’t enjoying it anymore, I was like, but I know I should do it because it adds all of these X, Y, Z benefits and realizing that it’s something that I was struggling with and unhappy with was really hard because I was like no but I need to do it and then I was like no but I really don’t want to. So for anybody that is in that place, for anybody that’s feeling like this is something that I used to enjoy and now it’s just causing me stress and I dislike it and I feel stuck. I talked about this a little bit earlier, but going back to the why and figuring out like intrinsic, like your intrinsic motivation, like inside of you deep down, like what is the reason?

Because if you say, I want to lose weight, okay, why? And then you can be like, well, I don’t feel confident. Okay, why? Like digging down and really finding what is motivating you is a great place to start and if your Workouts aren’t bringing you the happiness that they were before Don’t be afraid to take a break like really being with yourself is like something that nobody else has to do. So, even as a trainer, like, I had to take a break from strength training, even though I know all of the benefits that can come from it. My mental health was suffering, which was like the most detrimental part of all of it because I wasn’t enjoying my workouts and I wasn’t progressing because my body was like, please stop, like we don’t like this anymore.

So yeah, I would just say like finding that reason, like getting down to the nitty-gritty of it and being like, this isn’t something that I enjoy anymore. And then if you want your activity to be, in my case it was Pilates, which is resistance training, but it’s not the, like, heavy weightlifting that I was doing before I took that break. But it brought me so much joy!

Ryann

Me too!

Madeline

Like, I was so happy! And I, that time where I was only doing Pilates and not, like, I didn’t touch a single weight for, like, six months, which is the longest break that I have taken in my last seven years of weightlifting. And I came back, you know, it took a little bit of time, but I came back stronger and better at the strength training because I took that break. And I like had the like mental check and I was just like, listen, I got to be honest with myself. Like I, I can’t, I can’t be unhappy with this anymore

Ryann

Yeah that why and that why is huge right we have to get down deeper for it to actually add more to our lives. I love how you said Okay, if you want to lose weight, all right, but why and I think that when we can take it from, I wanna lose weight to, I wanna be there for my kids. I wanna be able to run around with my husband or my partner. I wanna be able to swim when I go on this epic vacation. I wanna be able to, mine has always been, I wanna be able to take up all the grocery bags in one trip.

Madeline

Yes! One trip.

Ryann

You know, it doesn’t have to be so serious, but just having something deeper is huge. Oh my gosh. Madeline, thank you for all of that. I could talk to you forever. And I think that that’s such a great starting point for anybody who is struggling. And I so appreciate you bringing awareness to how easy it is to fall into the trap of the numbers, but also I love that you can serve as that person of hope that you can get away from the numbers and you can rebuild this healthy relationship with food and movement after being in that for so long. Oh, so good. So for anybody who wants to connect with you further, wants to chat with you further? Where can everybody find you?

Madeline

My main platform right now is Instagram. So I just run everything through Instagram. My handle is Coach Mads Coats. And I would love to talk to anyone. Like seriously, send me a DM, like comment on any of my posts, even if you’re like creeping into like years back and you’re like, I love this recipe, you know, whatever. Like, I think people can be afraid of trainers sometimes, but like, I hope that after talking like this and like about all this stuff to you that it just shows that I’m a person too and I’ve been there and I know how it feels and I know what you’re going through and it doesn’t have to be scary. Like we can just connect and like be people, you know?

Ryann

I love it so much. Thank you so much again. This was amazing. And I’m so grateful.

Madeline

Me too. It was so wonderful to talk to you, Ryann.